Nowhere will the pain of ending Obamacare tax credits sting like it will in Andy Harris’ backyard.

Five percent of residents in Worcester County, where Ocean City drives the economy with thousands of seasonal jobs, decide if they can afford up to 95% increases in the cost of health insurance or gamble on going uninsured.

While a small number compared to Central Maryland, this tiny county two hours from Annapolis, has Maryland’s highest Affordable Care Act enrollment rate.

Yet the Eastern Shore Republican doesn’t want to talk about this. He didn’t have an answer last month when confronted by the first caller to one of his telephone town halls — a woman worried about the impact on her family of losing health insurance coverage.

“We think the solution is to try to do something to make sure all the premiums go down,” he said, according to the Associated Press. He predicted Congress would “probably negotiate some off-ramp” later.

What that might be is anyone’s guess.

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AWOL Andy wants me fired! Voters want a town hall.

Mar 24, 2025

As the federal shutdown enters its second month, the partisan lines in Washington remain clear. Republican majorities in Congress need a small number of Democrats to pass a short-term funding bill.

Democrats are holding out, using the only leverage they have when all three branches of government are in the GOP’s grip — demanding compromise on the tax credits.

In Maryland, it’s Harris on one side and nine congressional Democrats, including two senators, on the other.

The split gets a little extra national attention because Harris heads the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus.

“Look, they want to continue a COVID-era insurance company giveaway scheme,” he told the Daily Signal at the start of this shutdown. “The insurance companies have made billions of dollars off the enhanced tax credits. It’s about time to return to the pre-COVID level of tax credits.”

He’s right, if you ignore the facts. But Harris prefers his own reality.

While tax credits subsidizing health insurance have been part of ACA since it passed in 2010, they were expanded significantly in 2021. That expansion pushed Maryland enrollment up by 13% by making health insurance even more affordable.

Let the expanded credits expire Jan. 1, and a rapid reversal will follow.

“We have done a tremendous job over the last 15 years at the state and national level to bring that [uninsured] rate down,” U.S. Rep. Sarah Elfreth, a Democrat, said last month. “This is the first time we’re going to see it skyrocket unless we act.”

Harris points the finger at Democrats, blaming them for the expiration Saturday of federal funding for food assistance.

“With SNAP benefits about to run out, Maryland’s Senators [Chris Van Hollen and Angela Alsobrooks] are still refusing to reopen the government,“ he wrote on X last week. ”They are holding out for more spending and taxpayer-funded healthcare for illegal immigrants at the expense of Maryland families."

It’s another made-up criticism, wrapped in a skewed view of responsibility for this mess.

After a federal judge ordered SNAP funding restored, the Trump administration said Monday it would pay out about half what people normally get this month.

Harris is no friend of hunger relief. He voted to make it harder to get SNAP benefits and is a constant critic of Gov. Wes Moore, who released enough money Monday to close the funding gap in November.

Democrats clapped right back at Harris, in unusually blunt terms.

“Andy we’ve been working to reopen the government and lower health care costs for American families,” Van Hollen wrote. “You’ve been on a paid vacation for five weeks. Let us know when you’re done spreading lies on social media and ready to come back to work.”

The House of Representatives has been in recess for more than a month as Senate Republicans repeatedly go through show vote after show vote without compromise.

In September, the Maryland Insurance Administration counted 240,000 residents enrolled in Obamacare exchanges, adding that 190,000 of them rely on the tax credits.

Projections indicate that 90,000 people will drop coverage if the credits are not renewed and there is no state subsidy.

Younger, healthier people are likely to drop coverage first. The state will continue some of the subsidies for one year, but only for the poorest families and individuals.

It’s a crappy dilemma, but Harris says nothing that makes it seem like he sees the problem. Others do.

“I see the numbers. I see what Marylanders earn,” said Maryland Comptroller Brooke Lierman, also a Democrat. “I see what they pay in taxes. I see what they struggle to afford.”

Maryland is divided among giant, mid-size and tiny counties. More than 4 million people live in Montgomery, Prince George’s, Baltimore and Anne Arundel counties plus the city of Baltimore. Combined, 128,345 people in this part of the state rely on the insurance.

That’s more than half the total insured under ACA. But some of the smallest counties have significant portions of their populations enrolled, a relative difference that makes them more vulnerable to increases in the uninsured.

In Worcester County, 2,839 people use Obamacare exchanges — 5.2% of the 54,354 residents. These aren’t the retirees flooding Eastern Shore counties and voting Republican; they’re the people who keep Ocean City’s economy going.

The state’s biggest county, Montgomery, has 4% enrollment, but that’s a smaller percentage than in tiny Talbot County at 4.1%. Wicomico is right behind at 3.9%, Dorchester — Harris’ home county — has 3.6% enrollment and Kent has 3.3%.

Other top-enrolled counties include Garrett at 4%, Howard at 3.2%, Prince George’s and Queen Anne’s at 3.1% and Baltimore County at 3%.

The cost of a jump in uninsured Marylanders will fall hardest on rural hospitals serving Harris’ district — compounding deep cuts to Medicaid that he supported.

“Hospitals in the 3rd District are going to be able to weather the storm,” Elfreth said. “But it’s the rural hospitals, disproportionately in Republican districts, that are going to see their margins absolutely disappear with these 1-2-3 punches, Medicaid, pharmaceutical costs and ACA.”

All this means some of the people who support Harris will be surprised to learn he’s talking trash about them.

Maryland Democrats are toying with redrawing the boundaries of Harris’ district, joining the national wave of tit-for-tat gerrymandering ahead of the midterms.

It’s not necessary.

All Democrats have to do is shout over and over that Harris abandoned his constituents, hiding his actions with lies.

And quickly get behind a candidate who can beat him with the facts.