A “Huge Political Problem” — How Senate GOP-Backed Lawsuit Against Pre-Existing Conditions Coverage Protections is An Election Year “Nightmare”

The Supreme Court announced a bombshell decision to hear the GOP lawsuit to overturn the entire Affordable Care Act and “throw out protections for pre-existing conditions” — setting up a potential “nightmare” and “huge political problem” for Republican senators in 2020. Health care is the number one issue for voters in Senate battlegrounds across the country, and now “there’s a decent chance those arguments could fall in October — just weeks, or potentially even days — before Election Day.”

After supporting the unpopular tax bill that set this lawsuit in motion, not a single Republican in the Senate has taken meaningful steps to stop the GOP’s lawsuit. Vulnerable incumbents like Susan Collins, Martha McSally, Cory Gardner, Joni Ernst, Thom Tillis, David Perdue, and John Cornyn were already on the wrong side of this issue after repeatedly voting in Washington to spike costs and threaten coverage for their constituents by dismantling the health care law and its core protections.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Axios: The Supreme Court could be Trump’s ACA nightmare

By Sam Baker

March 3, 2020

Key Points:

• The Supreme Court’s next big Affordable Care Act case could be a huge political problem for President Trump.

• Why it matters: The Trump administration will spend the next several months urging the court to strip away some 20 million people’s health insurance and to throw out protections for pre-existing conditions. And it may all come to a head just before Election Day.

• Driving the news: The court said yesterday that it will hear the challenge filed by Republican attorneys general, and supported by the Trump administration, that aims to strike down the entire ACA.

• What’s next: Oral arguments in the case haven’t been scheduled yet, but following the court’s standard timeline, there’s a decent chance those arguments could fall in October — just weeks, or potentially even days — before Election Day.

• Election-eve arguments over the fate of 20 million people’s health care coverage would be a particularly great gift for Democrats, but even if they fall after Nov. 3, this case is still a gift.

• Where it stands: Polls consistently show that health care is among voters’ most important issues in 2020, and if this case becomes a big part of that debate, it’s likely to disproportionately benefit Democrats.

• Opposition to the health care law doesn’t rile up the Republican base the way it used to. But as we saw during the repeal-and-replace saga of 2017 and then in the 2018 midterms, threats to those protections definitely motivates Democrats.

• The ACA as a whole is now popular, and some of its main provisions — like guaranteed coverage for people with pre-existing conditions — have always been popular.

• Trump has repeatedly brushed aside questions about pre-existing conditions, saying his administration will protect patients who have them. But neither the White House nor congressional Republicans have ever put forward a plan that would ensure the same level of protection as the ACA.

• The bottom line: “Regardless of the date of oral argument, the Democratic candidate will — and should! — use this case to bludgeon President Trump at every turn,” University of Michigan law professor and ACA legal guru Nicholas Bagley tweeted.

Read the full story here.

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