[Excerpt] In January 2017, the House and Senate adopted a budget resolution for FY2017 (S.Con.Res. 3), which reflects an agreement between the chambers on the budget for FY2017 and sets forth budgetary levels for FY2018-FY2026. S.Con.Res. 3 also includes reconciliation instructions directing specific committees to develop and report legislation that would change laws within their respective jurisdictions to reduce the deficit. These instructions trigger the budget reconciliation process, which may allow certain legislation to be considered under expedited procedures. The reconciliation instructions included in S.Con.Res. 3 direct two committees in each chamber to report legislation within their jurisdictions that would reduce the deficit by $1 billion over the period FY2017-FY2026. In the House, the Committee on Ways and Means and the Energy and Commerce Committee are directed to report. In the Senate, the Committee on Finance and the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions are directed to report.
In response to the reconciliation instructions, there was activity in four different House committees—Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, Budget, and Rules—during the first quarter of 2017. The result of this activity was H.R. 1628, the American Health Care Act (AHCA) of 2017. The version of the AHCA as passed by the House on May 4, 2017 (which incorporated eight amendments referenced in H.Res. 228 and H.Res. 308), is the topic of this report. The bill includes a number of provisions that would repeal or modify parts of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA; P.L. 111-148, as amended). For example, the bill would repeal the ACA’s cost-sharing subsidies for lower-income individuals who purchase health insurance through the exchanges, and it would substitute the ACA’s premium tax credit for a tax credit with different eligibility rules and calculation requirements. The bill also would repeal some of the ACA’s Medicaid provisions, such as the changes the ACA made to presumptive eligibility and the state option to provide Medicaid coverage to non-elderly individuals with income above 133% of the federal poverty level (FPL)
