Since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, Republicans have waged war on health care. They tried to repeal the law dozens and dozens of times and Trump made sabotaging the ACA his top priority — but they failed, miserably. It cost them the House, the Senate, the White House, and governors offices across the country. And now Republicans have lost at the Supreme Court for a third time in their ten year mission to destroy the Affordable Care Act. 

While Republicans prioritized stripping millions of Americans of their health care coverage, even during a deadly global pandemic where Americans relied on their health care more than ever, Democrats never stopped fighting to expand access to care, lower costs, and protect people with preexisting conditions. 

Here’s a quick timeline to remind you of some of the endless ways Republicans tried, and failed, to strip health care away from the American people. 

Since the passage of the ACA, Republicans began a campaign to repeal the law, and voted time and time again to no success:

• From the day the ACA passed until President Obama left office, Republicans voted more than 70 times to repeal or change Obamacare.
• In the four national elections since the passage of the ACA, Republican candidates and outside groups spent $666 million on anti-Obamacare ads.
• In 2013, congressional Republicans were so against incorporating the Affordable Care Act into the budget that they shut down the government, costing the U.S. economy $24 billion.

Once Donald Trump was elected, he made it his top priority to gut the ACA by whatever means necessary, and replace it with a plan that never existed.

• Trump doubled down on efforts to appeal the Affordable Care Act starting day one of his campaign.
• Once Trump became president, the House GOP scrambled to come up with a repeal bill that they rammed through without transparency, expertise or bipartisan input.
• Even a global pandemic did not stop Trump from his attempt to overturn and sabotage the Affordable Care Act.
• In the midst of his attempts to undermine the ACA, Trump repeatedly claimed to have his own health care plans which we never saw:
  
  • JUNE of 2019 — TRUMP: “I’m going have a plan over the next month—”
  • JULY of 2020 — TRUMP: “You heard me yesterday. We’re signing a health care plan within two weeks, a full and complete health care plan that the Supreme Court decision on DACA gave me the right to do. So we’re going to solve—we’re going to sign an immigration plan, a health care plan, and various other plans. And nobody will have done what I’m doing in the next four weeks.”
  • JULY of 2020 — TRUMP: “Well, we’re going to be doing a healthcare plan. We’re going to be doing a very inclusive health care plan. I’ll be signing it sometime very soon.”
  • AUGUST of 2020 — TRUMP: “We’re going to be introducing a tremendous health care plan sometime prior — hopefully, prior to the end of the month.”
  • AUGUST of 2020 — TRUMP: “Over the next two weeks, I’ll be pursuing a major executive order requiring health insurance companies to cover all preexisting conditions for all customers.”
  • OCTOBER of 2020 — TRUMP: “It is fully developed. It’s going to be announced very soon.”