Unveiling a 2020 election stunt aimed at President Donald Trump’s campaign, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced a plan Wednesday to expand “Obamacare,” even as Trump’s administration is about to file arguments in a Supreme Court case to strike it down.
Pelosi announced an upcoming floor vote on her measure, setting up a debate that will juxtapose the Democrats’ top policy issue, Trump’s unrelenting efforts to dismantle Obama’s legacy, and the untamed coronavirus pandemic.
The move is meant to help President Joe Biden’s campaign by capitalizing on anxiety about the pandemic and tying up Republicans on a divisive issue.
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On Thursday, the Trump administration is expected to file papers with the Supreme Court arguing that the Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional. Pelosi wants her bill on the House floor Monday.
Trying to overturn a controversial health insurance expansion “was wrong any time,” Pelosi said.
“Now, it is beyond stupid,” she added. “Beyond stupid.”
The White House said Pelosi is just playing politics. “Instead of diving back into partisan games, Democrats should continue to work with the president on these important issues and ensuring our country emerges from this pandemic stronger than ever,” spokesman Judd Deere said Wednesday in a statement.
Pelosi’s legislation has no chance in the Republican-controlled Senate.
According to a memo last month by Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Cheri Bustos, D-Ill., the goal is to make Republicans squirm.
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“Republicans at all levels own this lawsuit’s attack on Americans’ health care,” said the memo. “They will be held responsible for their party-wide obsession with throwing our health care system into chaos and stripping health care from 20 million Americans during a global pandemic.”
It could be a political opportunity for Democrats heading towards a close election. Obama’s law has grown more popular since Trump’s unsuccessful effort to repeal it in 2017, when Republicans controlled both the House and Senate. In May, a poll from the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation found that 51% of Americans view “Obamacare” favorably while 41% have unfavorable views.
In the case before the court, Texas and other conservative-led states argue that the ACA was essentially rendered unconstitutional after Congress passed tax legislation in 2017 that eliminated the law’s unpopular fines for not having health insurance, but left in place its requirement that virtually all Americans have coverage.
The conservative states argued that elimination of the fines made the law’s so-called individual mandate unconstitutional. U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor in Texas agreed, adding that the mandate was so central to the law that without it the rest must also fall.
The Trump administration’s views on the law have shifted over time, but it has always supported getting rid of provisions that prohibit insurance companies from discriminating against people on account of their medical history.
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Nonetheless, Trump has repeatedly assured Americans that people with preexisting conditions would still be protected.
A federal appeals court in New Orleans found the health law’s insurance requirement to be unconstitutional, but made no decision on such popular provisions as protections for people with preexisting conditions, Medicaid expansion and coverage for young adults up to age 26 on their parents’ policies. It sent the case back to O’Connor to determine whether other parts of the law can be separated from the insurance requirement, and remain in place.
Democratic-led states supporting the ACA appealed to the Supreme Court. It’s unclear if the court will hear oral arguments before the November election. A decision is unlikely until next year.
The court has twice upheld the law, with Chief Justice John Roberts memorably siding with the court’s liberals in 2012, amid Obama’s reelection campaign. The majority that upheld the law twice remains on the court.
The Associated Press contributed to this article