AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Another week passed without lawmakers being able to agree on a health care plan with the current subsidies expiring in less than three weeks. And a new plan that replaces the Affordable Care Act - often called Obamacare - is something President Trump has been promising for years. Here he is in 2011, speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I will fight to end Obamacare and replace it - replace it with something that makes sense for people and business and not bankrupt the country.
RASCOE: Fast forward 14 years, and here he is on Thursday night at a White House holiday party.
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TRUMP: And I really believe we can work on health care together and come up with something that's going to be much better, much less expensive for the people, less expensive for our nation.
RASCOE: But so far, neither the president nor his party have come up with a plan that'll pass Congress. We're joined now by NPR senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith. Good morning.
TAMARA KEITH, BYLINE: Good morning, Ayesha.
RASCOE: So, you know, things are at this critical stage, but Republicans are in control of the White House as well as Congress. Is there a way for them to turn health care into a win for their party?
KEITH: I mean, anything is possible. There are 24 million people who get their insurance on the Affordable Care Act exchanges, and an analysis by KFF estimates that they will see their insurance premiums more than double without an extension of these tax credits, but there isn't a cohesive Republican plan or position. The party is really divided amongst itself. President Trump isn't engaged in the details and certainly isn't throwing his weight behind getting something passed. Dueling Republican and Democratic plans failed in the Senate last week. The House heads home for the holidays on Thursday. So the clock is really ticking on a solution, and it just doesn't look like there's enough Republican support for a clean extension of the tax credits, at least not yet. If people want coverage on January 1, they have to sign up for a plan by tomorrow. So that's what I mean by the clock ticking.
RASCOE: Well, is there any polling on this to show how the president's base feels about these, you know, ACA subsidies expiring?
KEITH: KFF polled people who get their coverage through the marketplaces. So these are people that would be directly affected by the tax credits expiring. In that group, 72% of Republicans say Congress should extend the tax credits. Also according to KFF, nearly 6 in 10 people who get their insurance through the ACA marketplaces live in congressional districts that are represented by a Republican.
RASCOE: OK. So turning to a new lawsuit against the president now. He's being sued by a preservation group over his White House ballroom renovations. What's that about, and how is the White House responding?
KEITH: Yeah. The National Trust for Historic Preservation is trying to temporarily halt construction on the $300 billion ballroom. They're arguing that the Trump administration hasn't gone through the proper approvals. You'll remember in October, the entire East Wing of the White House was demolished to make way for a 90,000-square-foot ballroom. That was without any plans being submitted to the appropriate commissions for approval and without public comment until after the fact, when there was a lot of negative public comment. Now there are cranes and pile drivers operating on the White House grounds, but still no plans submitted. The president says he loves the sound, but Carol Quillen, the president and CEO of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, is concerned by the lack of transparency and public input.
CAROL QUILLEN: We feel like we have no choice here. We need to fulfill our mission. We need to speak on behalf of the American public, and we need to make the case that these processes are important and that respecting them matters because our history matters.
KEITH: White House spokesman Davis Ingle told me, quote, "President Trump has full legal authority to modernize, renovate and beautify the White House, just like all of his predecessors did."
RASCOE: And briefly in the time we have left, President Trump said yesterday that there would be, quote, "very serious retaliation" after two U.S. service members and an American civilian were killed in an ISIS attack in Syria. Do we know more about what that might entail?
KEITH: We do not. President Trump spoke briefly on the south lawn of the White House, saying that he blames the Islamic terrorist group ISIS for the attack and said it was an attack on both Syria and the United States. In a post on social media, Trump said that Syria's president is extremely angry and disturbed by the attack and that it was in an area that is not fully controlled by the government.
RASCOE: That's NPR senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith. Thanks, Tam.
KEITH: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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