The MeidasTouch Podcast - MAGA Mike Shuts Down House as He Loses All Control

Episode Date: December 18, 2025

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on MAGA Mike Johnson losing control and shutting down the House of Representatives to avoid a vote before the new year on the discharge petition to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies after four Republicans joined forces with Democrats. Go to https://qualialife.com/MEIDAS for up to 50% off your purchase and use code MEIDAS for an additional 15%. Visit https://meidasplus.com for more! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. Oof, Maga Mike Johnson has shut down the House of Representatives. He's sending all of the members home. He's saying it's time to go on an early vacation. This has he's totally lost control of the House of Representatives. Four MAGA Republicans join forces with the Democrats to put forward a discharged petition that would force a vote for a three-year extended. on the Affordable Care Act subsidies.

Certain so-called moderate Republicans who are not all that moderate were trying to propose different solutions in order to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies via discharge petitions. They ended up getting into a fight with each other so they could actually propose nothing. And you had Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries,

hold his ground and say, that's not what the American people want. They won a clean three-year extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies. Meanwhile, MAGA Mike and other MAGA leadership was telling those so-called moderate Republicans that we will absolutely kill any bill, any discharge petition that has any extension at all of the Affordable Care Act subsidies. So what went down yesterday was that those four Republicans joined forces with the Democrats. They effectuated the discharge petition.

and rather than allow it to ripen now, Maga Mike calls a vacation. He says, we're all leaving. This way, he can avoid a vote on the discharge petition to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies, and he wants to push it until later in January, and this assures that the Affordable Care Act subsidy extension will expire when it expires on December 31st.

Folks, this is as cruel. as it gets. And it gets even crueler because yesterday Maga Mike put forward and had his Republican base support another health care plan that had nothing to do with extending the Affordable Care Act subsidies. But what it actually did is in Section 202, it limited women's reproductive rights and basically stopped funding for any plans that would provide women's reproductive rights in blue states as well. So it would effectively kill women's reproductive rights in blue states

or severely harm them if you were on an existing plan. So not only did Maga Mike refuse to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies, he took the lack of extended Affordable Care Act subsidies and said, let's screw women's reproductive rights. So Maga Mike is

running through the halls of Congress and he's saying, I haven't lost control. I haven't lost control. This as he's lost control of the House as those four Republicans were like, okay, well, if we can't support an extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies because Maga Mike, you're killing it. We're going to join forces with the Democrats and Hakeem Jeffries held his ground and those Republicans sided with Jeffries. Watch Maga Mike run away right after he shuts down the house and says, everybody's going home.

Here, play this clip. Have you lost his hold of the house? I have not lost control. Because this is the third time. We have the smallest majority in U.S. history. These are not normal times. There are processes and procedures in the house that are less frequently used when there are larger majorities. And when you have the luxury of having 10 or 15 people who disagree on something, you know, you don't have to do with it. Now, before Maga Mike shut it down and you see him running in the hallways there saying, I haven't lost control.

I haven't lost control. Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, wrote, urgent update. Our bipartisan petition to force a vote on a straightforward extension of the Affordable Care Act tax credits now has 218 signatures. Mike Johnson should bring the bill to the floor immediately.

Mike Johnson's response, vacation. We're all going home. We're shutting it down. Just how irresponsible, how immature, and how dangerous. that is, right? And just think about it, though. In the past three weeks, there's been like three separate discharge petitions. Maybe you go back slightly longer than that. You have the Epstein discharge petition. Then there was a discharge petition to overturn Donald Trump banning

collective bargaining agreement by federal government employees. And then there was this discharge petition to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies, but rather than Maga Mike taking it up immediately after this bipartisan end run around him because he and Trump are blocking it, he shuts down Congress. You can't get more demeaning and just despicable than that. Well, you can. Donald Trump then held that deranged national address,

if you even want to call it that last night. And what was Donald Trump saying? Donald Trump said, it's the unaffordable care act. And Democrats are the one raising your premiums. They're the ones fighting to raise it. when it's the exact opposite. Donald Trump's tactics are the Putin tactics.

Like when Putin goes, denotification, right? And makes those vicious lies as pretext to invade Ukraine. Donald Trump goes, it's the Democrats who are raising your premiums. We need to go attack Venezuela because they stole our land. They stole our oil. They're bringing in fentanyl when they're done. What are you talking about? There's no fentanyl coming out of Venezuela.

What land did they steal? What are you talking about? Anyway, here's what Donald Trump. Trump says. Here, play this clip. Now in the steep increase in premiums being demanded by the Democrats, and they are demanding those increases, and it's their fault. It is not the Republicans' fault. It's the Democrats' fault. It's the unaffordable care act, and everybody knew it. And by the way, it shouldn't be lost on us that Maga Mike Johnson is shutting down the House of Representatives before the day when the Epstein files are set to be released.

That's when he's sending all of the members home on a vacation before they're supposed to actually go home in the first place. Now, as Maga Mike continues to lose control, when he's confronted with the fact that he's going to cost 22 to 24 million Americans to lose health care now by refusing to allow this Affordable Care Act extension, even with this discharge petition, Magam Mike says, yeah, it's only 7%. 7% of 330 million is 23 million people, as Jonathan Reiner points out.

That's a lot of freaking people. And they just pooh, 2,3 million people losing their health care and dying. That's why these magas are a death cult. Right? I mean, who does this? Play this clip of Maga Mike. Let's play it right here. But here's the false narrative.

The Democrats are pretending as though this affects everybody in the country. It affects 7% of Americans, this extent. subsidy. And of those, even if it was extended, without any reforms at all, it would only reduce that small group of Americans premiums by 5.7%. The Democrats have tried to pretend as though this is all about... No, I understand that this is not for everybody, but it's 22 to 24 million Americans, and there are some Republicans whose districts are going to face some real trouble and some real issues with this. We've talked to some of them. I understand that Mike Loller from New York was particularly upset yesterday that he was kind of furious about it,

said it's idiotic, it's political malpractice. That's what he told Axios on some of this. They said they could hear him yelling from outside the room yesterday where all of you were meeting. Well, no, no, I was in that room with him, and Mike Luller's one of my close friends. In fact, I was with him in his district in New York City just two weeks ago, campaigning for a couple of days, raising him money and helping him get reelected. He's an essential member of our conference and a really smart guy. And what he was arguing, for is this 7% of Americans. But here's the point. What we're going to do today is the first of multiple steps to help not just 7% of Americans, but 100% of Americans reduce their premiums,

actually reduce their premiums, not subsidized insurance companies to raise the premiums, but reduce them. And the first of those votes is today. This is the lower premiums for all Americans act we're going to have on the floor. Look, magnesium is something most of us lack. And if you're taking the drugstore variant, you're still not getting the full picture. farming, chronic stress, and everyday aging all make it worse. Almost every supplement uses one form of magnesium. But magnesium comes in many forms, and each form helps your health in a different way. That's exactly why you need to try Qualia magnesium Plus. Most people know that magnesium is critical for sleep, but some forms help muscle recovery, brain function, heart health, bone health, mood,

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15% off your order. That's qualia life.com slash mitus, Q-U-A-L-I-A-L-A-L-A-L-O-com slash mitis, and use code Midas. Thanks, Qualia, for sponsoring this episode. You got to give a hat tip. You got to give credit where credit is due, right? Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, he stood on business. He stood his ground. Take a look at how Axios describes it. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries adhered to a single principle

to outflank Magamike Johnson on extending the Affordable Care Act tax credits. Don't give an inch to Republican moderates looking for an escape hatch. Jeffery's got everything he wanted. Frankly, the people got everything they wanted because Jeffrey stood on business. Democrats will get a House vote on a three-year extension on these subsidies without any income caps or offsets. One senior House Democrat told Axios of the leadership's thinking, we're going to have to negotiate with the Senate, but you don't start from a place of weakness. You start from a place of strength. You have Democrat Jared Huffman say Jeffries has been validated completely after Democrats started

2025 with a lot of angst and people wondering if we had the medal. Even Democratic Congress member Roe Conno said he held his ground and we won. Democratic Congress member Tom Swazi, he described how the MAGA plan all fell apart as they refused to reach a basic compromise. And Swazi was saying, look, I was trying to reach a compromise with these Republicans when it comes to the Affordable Care Act subsidy extensions, you know, maybe we do income caps. I don't know, we'll try to figure out a solution. He goes, but ultimately, they fought each other. They're out of control. And so they had no choice but to join the Democrat three-year Affordable

Care Act subsidy extension. Here, play this clip right here. That's absolutely right. This is a Democratic proposal to just extend it for three years. And I'm not opposed to income caps. I have lots of bipartisan bills I've signed on to to have income caps. And if you make above $300,000, a year, you don't get a tax credit. So, and fraud protections and things like that, which were part of the compromises we made. But because the Republican leadership refused to put anything on the floor, these Republican colleagues that are very concerned about this issue said, you know, we're going to just do what we can.

We've got to get this thing off the ground. And then to rub it in that Maga Mike has just completely lost control, you then had Democratic Congress member McGovern. really pushing back at that MAGA guy Congress member Mast who chairs the foreign, I think foreign intelligence or foreign services committee. And Congress member McGovern starts in response to Mast holding up photos of like John Kerry with Maduro

from like many years ago. McGovern's like, okay, how about Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein? How about Donald Trump and Putin? How about Donald Trump and Kim Jong-win? Really, you want to start showing photographs? That's what we're doing here. Here, play this clip of McGovern. play it. Mr. Speaker, this is serious. It is not a joke. It's not just about pictures, but pictures

tell a thousand words. You came here to prevent the president from defending the United States of America. Number one. Number two, he made a big deal about pictures that if you're in a picture with somebody and you touch them, that somehow you were affiliated with them. Well, here's a picture of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin with a nice handshake. What does that, does that say that Trump is somehow, you know, Vladimir Putin's friend, or here's Trump with Kim Jong-un, you know, giving a nice hug, another dictator that Trump seems to be enamored with. I mean, I don't think, Mr. Speaker, you know, the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee has said some strange things today about, you know, how you interpret photographs and if people are shaking hands or whatever, but somehow

if your arm is around somebody, that means that you're your dear friends. And I'm just looking at this photo of Donald Trump with his arm around Jeffrey M. Epstein, by your standards, there must be in love. But, you know, this is not, this debate is not about the gentleman's personal weird code on touching. This is about war. And then as Maga Mike shuts down the House of Representatives, our friend Pablo Monriquez, who does a great job on the hill. Here's what he interviews AOC. And he's like, what do you think about J.D. Vance? And she goes, I would stomp him in a head-to-head if we ever had to run against each other. Here, play this clip right here.

The reaction, or do you think that you'll beat that you could beat J.D. Vance in a head-to-head race for president, as polling suggests in 2028. Listen, these polls like three years out are, you know, they are what they are. But let the record show, I would stop him. I would stomped him. Thank you, Congresswoman. And finally, let me play you out with Democratic Congress member, Jamie Raskin. And Jamie Raskin basically says, can we just get real here for a second? If Trump and Maga Mike and Stephen Miller really had their way, I mean, do you realize what they would be doing to our country? Like, do you realize if they could truly get through everything they wanted, how none of what they're doing makes any sense?

Let's play this clip. Trying to throw money at soldiers. but that's not how you build a strong economy. And, I mean, take his comments on immigration. Again, the exact opposite of the truth. I mean, if he and Stephen Miller really had their way and they not only staged all of these conflicts all over the country and raided people's communities,

but say they really got rid of 12 million undocumented people in the country, we would see a collapse of a whole bunch of sectors, including the farm sector, including seafood, including construction, including landscaping. And there are already serious labor shortages that have broken out all around the country. And yet he always goes back to the well of stereotyping and demonizing people instead of saying, let's get together and pass an actual comprehensive immigration reform bill. And that's the last thing.

I guess I'll say, Caitlin, there were no plans. There were no programs. There were no policy proposals. nothing out there was it was just a bunch of meaningless rhetoric well there you have it folks let me know what you think sorry magamike you lost control but how pathetic is it that he shuts down the house what a baby hit subscribe help us get to six million thank you so much and have a great day love this video support independent media and unlock exclusive content add free videos and custom emojis by becoming a paid member of our youtube channel today you can also gift

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