Like every other government shutdown over the past 30 years, this one began with the House of Representatives under Republican control. The Republican House majority passed a government funding bill with just one Democratic vote after refusing to negotiate with the House minority, and then canceled two days of its session prior to a pre-scheduled recess, avoiding any more votes.

Senate Republicans also voted down a Democratic bill to fund the government that included Democrats' priorities to restore expiring tax credits for health care coverage and reverse Medicaid cuts passed by the GOP.

• Democrats offered to help Republicans keep the government open in exchange for saving health care funding for millions of Americans, but were rebuffed. Politico reported that a Democratic bill released in mid-September “links funding the government through Oct. 31 to two of the party’s other priorities: health care assistance and placing limits on President Donald Trump’s ability to unilaterally roll back funds previously approved by Congress.” More specifically, the bill “would extend boosted Affordable Care Act insurance subsidies that will otherwise expire on Dec. 31. It also would reverse cuts to Medicaid and other health programs that Republicans enacted as part of their party-line megabill this summer.” According to Politico, “Republican leaders are, so far, not negotiating with” Democrats. [Politico, 9/17/25; NPR, 9/23/25; Axios, 9/29/25]
• Republican cuts to Medicaid are expected to cost more than 10 million people their health coverage. A KFF analysis of CBO projections about Republicans’ “One, Big, Beautiful Bill” estimated that “more than 10.3 million people are likely to lose Medicaid.” [KFF, 7/23/25]
• Republicans’ failure to extend the enhanced premium tax credits for the Affordable Care Act is estimated to cost nearly 5 million people their health coverage just next year. The Urban Institute stated: “We project that 4.8 million more people will be uninsured in 2026 relative to a policy that extends enhanced PTCs [premium tax credits], an increase in the uninsured population of 21 percent.” The report further explained that “net premiums will more than double, from $1,171 to $2,455, for people with incomes from 250 percent of FPL [federal poverty level] to 400 percent of FPL,” and “nearly double, from $4,436 to $8,471, for people with incomes above 400 percent of FPL who receive subsidized Marketplace coverage under enhanced PTCs, but who would pay the full premium were they to expire.” [Urban Institute, 9/17/25]

Undocumented immigrants are already barred from enrolling in Medicaid and from purchasing coverage through the Affordable Care Act marketplace. As The New York Times reported, Democrats’ proposed funding package would not change this. It would not extend Medicaid and ACA coverage to undocumented immigrants.

Right-wing media have seemingly conflated “lawfully present” immigrants — which includes refugees, green card holders, and other migrants with some sort of documentation — with undocumented immigrants. Several categories of “lawfully present” immigrants were excluded from these benefits in the GOP law passed this summer, and Democrats’ legislation would restore their eligibility. Some media figures have also falsely suggested that states — some of which use their own funds to provide health coverage to immigrants — are actually using federal dollars to “fund people who are here illegally” to justify their claims about Democrats.

• Fox Business host Elizabeth MacDonald: “Democrats really are demanding nearly $200 billion in spending on free health care for illegal aliens.” MacDonald added: “It's literally in the Democrats' own bill in black and white, when they deny it.” [Fox Business, The Evening Edit, 10/6/25]
• Fox News host Ainsley Earhardt claimed Democrats say “we want health care for all Americans, but that would include the illegals.” Co-host Lawrence Jones replied, “They’re still fighting for illegals. You just lost the election over it.” He said: “You lost on it. Move forward.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 9/30/25]
• Fox host Sean Hannity said, “Schumer and his Democratic friends … want free health care for illegals as part of that deal.” He said it is “interesting because Democrats used to be totally against free health care benefits for illegals” and played clips of Schumer and then-first lady Hillary Clinton opposing the idea. [Fox News, Hannity, 9/29/25]
• Newsmax host Rob Schmitt: Democrats are “pushing for, what? Insurance? Free insurance? Free health care for all illegals in the country?” Schmitt added that Democrats want to undo Republicans’ Medicaid cuts, “meaning our millions of illegals … will once again be covered medically by you, by your paycheck. Millions, and millions, and millions of people.” [Newsmax, Rob Schmitt Tonight, 9/30/25]
• Newsmax guest Melanie Collette: Democrats are “doing a little sleight of hand” because some federal money goes to states, which “make their own little rules that tend to … fund people who are here illegally.” Collette also complained that “it also gets funded many other different ways, crowded emergency rooms and things like that, where the American people end up paying the price for that.” Host Alex Kraemer agreed, saying she “would love for all of these Democrats to take a little field trip to the emergency rooms in states like California to see what is going on out there.” [Newsmax, Wake Up America Early, 10/2/25]
• Fox Business correspondent Madison Alworth tried to verify Republicans’ claims that Democrats are seeking “free health care for illegals” by citing a state health program that “lawfully present noncitizens” are eligible for. After Alworth suggested that New York spent $12 billion on health care for undocumented immigrants in the last fiscal year through its “federally-funded Essential Plan,” she said: “The program provides health insurance for some lawfully present noncitizens, but Republicans argue that previously lax immigration policies allow people who should not have been in the country were granted asylum to access these benefits.” (New York’s Essential Plan also covers about a million U.S. citizens who reside in New York, and undocumented immigrants are not eligible for it.) [Fox Business, Varney & Co., 10/2/25; New York Focus, 9/26/25]
• Fox anchor John Roberts asked if Democrats seeking to restore policies to allow “federal health care dollars for people who are lawfully present” means “they want to give health care to illegal aliens.” His guest, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, replied, “They absolutely do.” [Fox News, America Reports, 10/2/25]

Emergency Medicaid, which comprises “less than 1% of total Medicaid spending,” reimburses hospitals for uncompensated emergency medical care for anyone who comes in with an emergency. This reimbursement goes to the medical providers themselves for uncompensated care provided to any patients unable to pay for services, which can include undocumented and authorized immigrants, as required under the Emergency Medical Treatment & Labor Act (EMTALA).

Republicans did not change this law. They merely reduced “how much the federal government shares in the expense for emergency care provided to undocumented immigrants in states that have expanded Medicaid under the ACA.” The repeal of this part of the GOP’s law passed this summer “would not change eligibility for care for the immigrants themselves,” according to KFF.

Yet, many MAGA media personalities attacked federal reimbursements for mandatory emergency medical care, claiming that Democrats are trying to fund undocumented immigrants’ health care. As one NBC reporter pointed out, the reason why hospitals are required to provide ER care to anyone who arrives with an emergency is that “if they wait to check insurance or legal status, patients would bleed out and/or die.”

• John Roberts: “On this idea of money for health care for illegal aliens,” Roberts says Democrats want to restore “full emergency room funding under Medicaid for illegal aliens.” [Fox News, Special Report, 10/2/25]
• Fox News senior White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich responded to Vice President JD Vance saying that Democrats want to give “taxpayer health care money to illegal aliens” by saying “that is true” because of “emergency care for illegal immigrants,” among other things. Heinrich noted that Republicans are citing funding for “emergency care for illegal immigrants, most of the time in hospitals” as part of their claim that Democrats are trying to extend health care funding for undocumented immigrants. [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 10/2/25]
• Fox Business guest Mehek Cooke suggested reimbursements for emergency medical care are “illegal funding.” On Mornings with Maria, Cooke said: “All of this illegal funding is absolutely going to illegals. It goes to hospitals to fund illegals, because you can’t turn away a migrant who comes in and says, ‘I need emergency funding.’ So, Democrats are lying to the American people.” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria, 10/2/25]
• Newsmax host Greg Kelly: “That’s what it means to be a Democrat these days, free health care for illegal migrants. Check out a long line at an emergency room near you.” Kelly added: “It’s terrible, terrible stuff.” [Newsmax, Greg Kelly Reports, 10/2/25]