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Two leading senators, hoping to stabilize teetering health insurance markets under the Affordable Care Act, reached a bipartisan deal on Tuesday to fund critical subsidies to insurers that President Trump moved just days ago to cut off. The plan by the senators, Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, and Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington, would fund the subsidies for two years, a step that would provide at least short-term certainty to insurers. The subsidies, known as cost-sharing reduction payments, reimburse insurance companies for lowering deductibles, co-payments and other out-of-pocket costs for low-income customers. (Kaplan and Pear, 10/17)

The Alexander-Murray deal addresses the Democrats’ most immediate concern: subsidies known as cost-sharing reduction payments, billions of dollars paid to insurers to limit out-of-pocket costs for low-income consumers. These payments had never been approved by Congress, and President Donald Trump announced last week he would discontinue making them. Democrats and health analysts feared cutting off the payments would send costs soaring in the ACA market and might prompt some insurers to exit. A two-year guarantee will lend the law some measure of stability at a time when Democrats are attempting to ward off repeated GOP efforts to roll it back. ... What do Republicans get? Mr. Alexander, the lead GOP negotiator, said that the deal expands the usefulness of ACA waivers that allow states to sidestep certain ACA rules to remold some aspects of the law, such as how premium subsidies are distributed or how much insurers can be permitted to charge their oldest customers. (Hackman and Wilde Mathews, 10/17)

The deal would restore $106 million in ObamaCare outreach funding that was cut by President Trump, according to a Democratic aide. (Sullivan, 10/17)

“For the next two years, we want to make sure people can buy insurance at affordable prices,” Alexander said Tuesday at the Capitol. “There is an emerging, encouraging consensus, and we’ll see how far it goes." (Levey and Mascaro, 10/17)

Murray, a Democrat from Washington state, said the two were ironing out a few final details and hoped to make an announcement "very soon."(McIntire, 10/17)

In many states, insurance companies had already priced in a possible end of CSRs to their rate requests, anticipating President Trump's move. In others, however, regulators explicitly asked companies to assume that the payments would be made — or gave little direction, leaving some insurance companies pushing for higher rates at the last minute. (Johnson, 10/17)

The agreement also includes what Democratic Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called “anti-sabotage” provisions. Democrats have accused Trump of deliberately undermining the law, and Trump has said his actions are meant to dismantle it since Republicans in the Senate haven’t been able to pass a repeal bill. Schumer said the Alexander-Murray package got “broad support” during Senate Democrats’ weekly lunch at the Capitol. (Edney, Wasson and Litvan, 10/17)

Kaiser Health News: 2 Senators Reach Deal On A Health Law Fix, But Bringing Congress Along Is Tricky

More than 60 senators have already participated in the meetings that led to the deal, Alexander said on the Senate floor. But the path to passage in the House is uncertain — with many conservatives vehemently opposed to anything that could be construed as helping the law they call “Obamacare” succeed. (Rovner, 10/17)

Summary of Tuesday's bipartisan health care agreement between two leading senators. (10/18)

Legislation introduced by two GOP senators would exempt certain people from ObamaCare’s requirement that everyone must purchase health insurance or pay a fine. Sens. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) and Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) called the law’s individual mandate “cruel” and said they want to exempt working class Americans from the requirement. (Weixel, 10/17)