Congress Stops ACA Healthcare Relief While Judiciary Targets Jack Smith

On this WTF Wednesday episode of A World Gone Mad, I take a hard look at a decision in Congress that is about to hit millions of people where it hurts most. This is not an accident and it is not bad timing. 

Washington knew this healthcare deadline was coming and leadership chose to let it happen anyway. When premiums rise and coverage becomes harder to afford, that outcome will be the result of a deliberate choice.

I walk through a House fight over ACA healthcare relief that should have been straightforward and was anything but. 

This is not about party slogans or cable news noise. It is about who controls the process and what happens when leadership refuses to let the system do what it is supposed to do. A vote matters, and when votes are blocked, accountability disappears with them.

What makes this moment impossible to ignore is who pushed back and how far things escalated. Quiet negotiations happened. Warnings were issued. Even unlikely voices inside Congress said this was going too far. 

When those efforts failed, lines were crossed that almost never get crossed, and that tells you everything about how boxed in some lawmakers have become.

This episode is really about power and how it is being used. This is not gridlock and it is not confusion. It is leadership deciding that protecting control matters more than protecting people. 

When the process itself is shut down, regular Americans are the ones left absorbing the consequences while Washington pretends it is all normal.

In the second half of the show, I turn to a closed door Judiciary confrontation involving Jack Smith. This is not about transparency or routine oversight. It is about pressure, intimidation, and the signal being sent to anyone who might consider enforcing the law against powerful figures. 

I explain why this moment matters far beyond one hearing room and why it should concern anyone who still believes the rule of law is supposed to apply evenly.

What ties both stories together is the same sickness running through the system. Accountability is treated like a threat and loyalty is treated like a requirement. 

When enforcing the law becomes dangerous and preventing harm becomes optional, something fundamental is broken.

This is A World Gone Mad. I say the things others will not because the truth does not need permission, and the consequences of silence are already landing on the people who can least afford them.

The holidays are rapidly approaching.

And, if you’d like to help support this podcast with a small donation before the holiday’s…

here’s the link: 

https://ko-fi.com/aworldgonemad

AWorldGoneMadPodcast@gmail.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Host Sets The Stage
• 1:46 Show Milestone And Ground Rules
• 2:46 ACA Subsidies On The Chopping Block
• 5:20 Centrist Republicans Break With Leadership
• 7:40 Discharge Petition Forces January Vote
• 9:40 Consequences Of Letting Subsidies Expire
• 12:01 Leadership Versus Voters

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

This is a world on that. This is a worldbone.

SPEAKER_00: 0:08

I'm Jeff Allen Wolfe. Welcome to A World Gone Mad. It's WTF Wednesday, and I question what the fuck is Donald the delusional one and his MAGA supporters doing now? And more importantly, how is any of this crap going to hurt us? The ones who actually care about our country and democracy. Okay, reluctantly, let's get into all of this madness. Here we go. A couple of things right off the bat. I want to state something that I need to state to everyone here. Repetitive, but that's okay. It's been a long day. I've got my third year anniversary coming up for this podcast, The World Gone Mad, in case anybody's interested. Come January. It'll be three years doing this show. Secondly, there's a lot of news stories out there today. Can't cover them all. Yes, I know Donald Trump had his address tonight. Yes, I know he said a lot of stupid things and lies. I really don't want to get into that right now. It's all garbage. Someone wrote me, oh my God, someone wrote me. I almost had a heart attack. Someone wrote me an email and asked, How many people do you do the show to? And I said, it really doesn't matter because I have over 500 plus people, listeners. Whether I do the show for one listener or a thousand, I'm still going to do the show. Okay, so let's get into the news I'd like to share with you tonight. Here we go. Let's talk about how Congress is about to jack up your health insurance premiums on purpose. Not by accident, not because the money ran out, not because nobody warned them, but because leadership chose to let it happen. And yes, the Republicans narrowly pushed through their version of health care bill. It's a bunch of garbage. It doesn't do much for us. The enhanced ACA subsidies are still going to expire. These are the subsidies that keep health insurance affordable for tens of millions of Americans. Republicans don't care. These are the tax credits expanded during the pandemic. The ones that stop premiums from exploding. When they expire, premiums don't gently rise. They jump hard. Families pay hundreds more per month, or they drop their coverage altogether. Washington Republican leadership knows this. Everyone knows this. This deadline didn't sneak up on them like a surprise birthday party. They forgot to plan. Now here's where it gets absurd. A handful of Republicans in the last 24 hours looked at this cliff and said, we can't do this. Not Democrats, Republicans. For Republicans, the boring centrist Republicans who normally stay glued to their leadership. Mike Lawler of New York, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Ryan McKenzie of Pennsylvania, Rob Bresnahan of Pennsylvania. These aren't radicals. These are spreadsheet people. They tried to do this the polite washing way. They negotiated. They proposed temporary extensions to the Affordable Care Act. They talked about income caps. So the help goes to working and middle class families. They even worked out on how to pay for it. Democrats were on board, dozens of them, more waiting if it came to a vote. All they needed was a vote. And Speaker Mike Johnson said no. Not no because it lacked support. Not no because it was reckless, not because leadership didn't want the vote to exist. So the House Rules Committee shut it down. No amendments, no floor vote, no debate, with only a few legislative days left before the ACA expires and everyone leaves town for Christmas. This wasn't a scheduling issue. That was a decision. Let the subsidies expire. That's what Republican leadership said. And at that point, the centrists, Republican centrists, realized something important. They were boxed out by their own leadership. So they did something almost unthinkable in Congress. They went nuclear. They signed on to a Democratic discharge petition. That's the procedural escape hatch meant for the minority party when leadership blocks a vote. Four Republicans crossed the line to join the Democrats. That was enough. Democrats now have the required signature, the force of floor vote on their proposed three-year extension of Enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries now has the 218 signatures needed to guarantee a vote under discharge petition rules. Now think about how insane that is. Republican members overriding their own speaker, Mike Johnson, just to let the House vote on whether people can afford health insurance. And here's the cruel twist listeners. The vote can't happen until January, which means the subsidies to the Affordable Care Act expire first, premiums spike first, damage first, debate later. People feel it before Congress fixes it. Behind closed doors, this exploded. Raised voices, heated arguments, members yelling loud enough that reporters could hear through the walls. Republicans openly furious that leadership is ignoring a real health care crisis and a political disaster. One Republican said the quiet part out loud. A clear extension without reforms isn't ideal. But letting the reforms, or rather the extensions, expire, is worse. That's the choice Republican leadership made. Not in perfect help versus perfect policy. In perfect help versus guaranteed harm. A Republican leadership chose harm. This isn't gridlock, this isn't confusion, this isn't both sides. This is Republican leadership refusing to allow a vote because a vote creates accountability. Premiums are about to spike for a lot of you. Families will notice, insurance companies will cash in, and Washington will act shocked when voters are furious. They were warned, they had options, they chose this. This is a world gone mad. And once again, regular people get stuck paying for it. Let's be clear about something before anyone tries to spin this. This isn't leadership, this is arrogance. Republican leadership is acting like they're in charge of us instead of the other way around. Like this is their system, their chessboard, their little procedural game. They're not kings, they're employees. We hired them to do a job, protect people, keep the system functioning, stop obvious harm when you see it coming. Instead, they're playing games with healthcare like it's a talking point instead of people's lives. Premiums going up, coverage disappearing, family scrambling, and leadership, Republican leadership's response is basically deal with it. They don't feel it, they don't worry about it, they don't miss a doctor's appointment because a bill suddenly doubled. So they stall. They posture, they pretend control is more important than competence. This is what contempt for voters look like. We didn't elect them to sit on their hands. We didn't elect them to block votes. We didn't elect these idiots for them to punish people to prove a point. They work for us. They don't understand that. And right now they're treating the American people like garbage. This is neglect, a total disregard for the people of America. And when voters finally say enough, Republican leadership is going to act shocked again. They shouldn't, because this is exactly what happens in a world gone mad. Okay, moving to Jack Smith. Jack Smith walks into a closed-door house judiciary deposition, and the first thing you should know is what this is not. This is not about transparency. This is not about oversight. This is a pressure test. It's act of retribution from Donald Trump. And it's a message to anyone in government thinking about doing their damn job next time. Smith shows up quietly, no statements, no spectacle, just a career prosecutor walking into a room where Republicans have already decided the verdict and are now shopping for the excuse. Meanwhile, Trump's out there openly calling for Smith to be prosecuted. That's the environment, that's the backdrop, and yet Jack Smith still shows up. His lawyer basically says the quiet part out loud. This guy followed the facts and the law to, you know, to go against Donald Trump, period. That should be the most boring sentence in America. Instead, it's treated like an act of war. Since when did doing your job become grounds for retaliation? Republicans are pretending this is about process. They say the investigation was partisan. They say it was abusive. They say lawmakers were unfairly surveilled. But here's the problem for them. Most of the investigative steps that Jack Smith took, they're angry about happened before Smith was even in charge. Different offices, different people, same facts, that little detail keeps running their narrative. Smith's actual cases were straightforward. Classified documents kept where they didn't belong, a pressure campaign to overturn an election that failed. January 6th happened. So courts reviewed it, judges ruled on it, Trump pleaded not guilty and never went to trial. Not because he was cleared, as we know, because the system stalled and then the political winds shifted. One judge wiped out the documents case. A Supreme Court ruling kneecapped the election case. Then Trump gets re-elected and drops the rest. And now here we are pretending the real scandal is the guy who brought the charges, Jack Smith, instead of the guy who generated them, Donald the delusional Trump. Republicans want to talk about phone records like it's some sinister plot. Toll records, not call content, numbers and durations, the most basic investigative tool there is. Used in drug cases, used in corruption cases, used all the time. But slap a Trump label on it, and suddenly it's framed as political weaponization. Jack Smith is expected to correct the record without crossing legal lines. He can't talk about grand jury material. He can't discuss sealed portions of his report. And Republicans know that. That's the trap. If Smith refuses to answer, they'll scream obstruction. If Smith answers too much, they'll accuse him of violating secrecy. Heads I win, tails, you go to jail. And that's the point. This isn't about learning anything new. It's about sending a warning. Investigate the powerful, and this is what waits for you. Subpoenas, smears, threats, retaliation dressed up as oversight. Jack Smith isn't on trial here. The rule of law is, and watching this unfold, you can't miss the message being broadcast loud and clear. In this system, accountability's optional, loyalty's mandatory. And if you dare confuse the two, you better be ready to sit in that chair next. And if you think this stops with Jack Smith, you're kidding yourself. What you're watching isn't strength, it's insecurity on full display. A system that was confident in the truth wouldn't need spectacle, subpoenas, or revenge hearings to feel whole. It would move on. Instead, it keeps circling the same grievance louder every time, because it has nothing new to say and no clean way out. That's not power holding the line. That's power losing control. And that's your WTF Wednesday. This is a world gone mad. I'm Jeff Allen Wolf. I'll be back Friday. I say this shit that no one else will because I really don't care who I piss off. I'm not mainstream media. No BS, no talking points, no fake headlines. The truth has to be told. Until then, Wolfpack listeners, remain skeptical, remain focused, but most of all, stay hopeful.

SPEAKER_01: 14:18

There is chaos in the world. And we need to stand up and freezer our democracy. This is a world time. This is a world time.