Today, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) joined CNBC’s Squawk Box to discuss Republicans' efforts to lower costs for all Americans following years of Biden's economic failures. Leader Scalise highlighted House Republicans' work to lower premiums and touted affordability wins so far this Congress, including the largest tax cut for working families in history.
 
Highlights from Leader Scalise’s interview:

On House Republicans working to lower premiums for all Americans:

“We've been working for a long time to lower premiums for all Americans, 100% of families across America. Democrats, as you know, have only been focused on trying to give big bailouts to insurance companies dealing with 7% of Americans. So big difference between the two sides.

“What we're going to be bringing to the House floor tomorrow — on the floor on Wednesday — is the Lower Premiums Act. This is a bill to lower health care premiums for all Americans. It's going to be focused on things like association health plans, the CHOICE Act, which is a way to use health savings accounts so that employers can work with their employees and give them better options for lower-premium health care plans. We do what's called cost-sharing reductions. It's basically a term up here in Washington to lower premiums for everybody in Obamacare. If you want to stay in Obamacare, a lot of people probably don't. But for those people, there would be a 12% reduction.”

On the Senate taking up the Lower Health Care Premiums for All Americans Act:

“I think Americans, once they see this, are going to call their United States senator, Republican and Democrat, because it will take 60 votes, make no mistake. Call your senator and say, 'Hey, I want some health care freedom. I want some choices.' We have PBM reform in this, too. So you get lower prescription drug costs. Another big cost escalator in health care is in this bill. So a lot of options for families to lower costs. We pass it through the House. It still has to go through the Senate.

“The President wants to sign this bill. The President's talked about this a lot. The President wants to see better options and lower premiums for families. He knows that the Affordable Care Act is not affordable. The Democrats created a system that's incredibly broken. They broke it, we're going to fix it.”

On increasing affordability following years of Bidenflation: 

“Think about this: for four years under Joe Biden, we saw a dramatic increase, 40-year increase in inflation, meaning things cost more, government was borrowing trillions of dollars, jacking up the cost of everything, and your buying power got lower during the Biden years. And so we're finally starting to fix it. We're bringing that down, but it's taking time. And I know people, they want to see it all happen overnight. We're seeing good improvement, but not enough yet. We're still working on it.

“Look, next April, when people file their taxes because of the tax bill we passed this year, you're not going to see it until you file your return, but most families are going to get over $1,000 back in their filing from the IRS because of no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, holding all the income levels the same so that we didn't get a tax increase. There was going to be a massive tax increase that would have hit. We're doing a number of things.

“We got a big housing bill coming up this week out of committee, and we're going to actually be focused on lowering the cost of homeownership. You talked about the Federal Reserve. I hope the Federal Reserve keeps lowering interest rates. As we're reducing the deficit, the deficit up here plays a big role in interest rates back home when people borrow for things like homeownership or credit cards. And so we're finally getting control over spending. That's going to lower interest rates, so people can go buy a home. And then we're bringing these housing bills.

“So all of it takes time, but we're working on all of it at the same time right now. I think early next year, you're going to start seeing bigger indicators. Trillions of investments already coming into the country from deals President Trump has already cut. Manufacturing, higher wage jobs. You're seeing it all. The AI revolution is bringing good jobs, too.”

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