REMINDER: Donald Trump Wants To Repeal the Affordable Care Act and Eliminate Essential Health Benefits

Approaching the anniversary of the Affordable Care Act, DNC spokesperson Aida Ross released the following statement: 

“Millions of hardworking Americans rely on essential health benefits provided by the Affordable Care Act, but Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans could not care less. Access to affordable prescription drugs, maternity and newborn care, mental health care, emergency services, and more are all on the chopping block for millions of Americans if Trump and the GOP have their way. The American people won’t let them get a chance – voters will reject Trump’s extreme MAGA health care agenda this November just like they did four years ago.”

Donald Trump’s efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act could eliminate access to essential health benefits such as affordable prescription drugs, maternity and newborn care, mental health care, and emergency services.

Vox: “Trump’s action could lead to many association health plans being exempted from core Obamacare requirements like the coverage of certain essential health benefits.”

“Essential health benefits, requiring that insurers cover everything from hospital care to prescription drugs to maternity care, are central to the ACA’s insurance protections: They prevent plans from crafting their coverage to attract mostly young and healthy customers at the expense of older and sicker people.”

New York Times: “[Trump’s health plans] may not have to provide certain ‘essential health benefits’ like mental health care, emergency services, maternity and newborn care, and prescription drugs.”

Politico: “Short-term plans do not have to meet the same requirements as a health insurance plan sold on the Obamacare insurance exchanges. These requirements can include coverage of pre-existing conditions and certain essential health benefits such as prescription drugs.”

USA Today Opinion: “[Repealing the ACA] would allow insurers to skip coverage of essential services, including maternity care.”

Trump is still pushing to repeal the ACA and rip away access to affordable care from millions of Americans. 

Daily Beast: “Trump Revives Plan to Dismantle Obamacare if Elected in 2024”

Mediaite: “‘OBAMACARE SUCKS!!!’ Trump Rants About New Plan — Years After He Promised It Was ‘Two Weeks’ Away”

HuffPost: “Donald Trump says he is still interested in repealing the Affordable Care Act, which means health care for tens of millions of people would be in jeopardy if he becomes president again next year. Trump said Saturday on his website Truth Social that he was ‘looking at alternatives’ to the 2010 health care law, also known as ‘Obamacare,’ which has reduced the number of Americans without health insurance to historic lows and established basic guarantees of coverage for all Americans regardless of pre-existing conditions.”

Trump: “The cost of Obamacare is out of control, plus, it’s not good Healthcare. I’m seriously looking at alternatives. We had a couple of Republican Senators who campaigned for 6 years against it, and then raised their hands not to terminate it. It was a low point for the Republican Party, but we should never give up!”

Trump: “Obamacare is a disaster. And I said, ‘We’re gonna do something about it.’”

When he was in office, Trump came up just one vote short in Congress from achieving his goal of repealing the Affordable Care Act.

The Hill: “On the campaign trail, Trump has doubled down on his promise to repeal the ACA, a feat he fell one vote short of in 2017.”

Trump: “I will get health care. I’m one vote short of health care. I’ll get health care.”

Reuters: “The most previous attempt to repeal Obamacare fell one vote short in July, in a humiliating setback for Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.”

Trump and MAGA Republicans’ plan to rip away Americans’ health care is overwhelmingly unpopular among voters. 

Politico: “Obamacare is even more popular than the last time Trump tried to kill it”

“Roughly three-in-five Americans like the 2010 health care law, even more than when Trump and Republicans in Congress came to the brink of wiping it out. And some of the Affordable Care Act’s better-known provisions — like protections for preexisting health conditions — engender even greater support.”

“[Trump] did more than pick at an electoral scab that party strategists hoped had healed by now. He threatened to bring back to life a potent electoral issue that contributed significantly to the GOP’s wipeout in the 2018 midterms and on which public opinion has only moved away from Republicans since.”

Washington Post: “But what’s clear is that an effort to ‘terminate’ Obamacare is not something Americans are pining for. Not only were the GOP’s efforts to repeal and replace Obamacare during Trump’s term historically unpopular, but the law also appears to have gotten more popular since then. … And when politicians talk of ending health insurance for tens of millions of Americans, dropping coverage of preexisting conditions and cutting Obamacare’s Medicaid funding, things get even dicier.”

CNN: “Obamacare has gotten popular. Trump doesn’t care”

Axios: “A new KFF poll underscores why former President Trump reigniting conversation about repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act was probably a bad idea politically … Only 32% of Republican respondents said they think the future of the ACA is a very important issue for 2024 presidential candidates to talk about.”

KFF Poll: 64% believe it is “very important” insurance companies continue to be prohibited from charging sick people more – including 55% of Republicans.

NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist Poll: “Thirteen years after the Affordable Care Act was signed into law, more than eight in ten Americans (83%) either agree or strongly agree that all Americans have a basic right to healthcare coverage.”

Bryan Bennett: “Per our October @NavigatorSurvey research, repealing the ACA (and January 6) remain the top concerns about Trump’s first term as president”

The Hill: “Majority of Americans don’t want preexisting condition protections eliminated: poll”

“Even among Republicans, 66 percent of respondents said they did not want to see the preexisting condition protections overturned. Overall, the poll showed 79 percent of respondents do not want the court to cancel coverage protections for Americans with preexisting conditions.”

KFF Poll: “Majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and independents say it is ‘very important’ to continue each of [the Affordable Care Act’s] protections for people with pre-existing conditions.”