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Reopening the ACA debate is politically risky for GOP

24 September 2020
 Dan Ackermann
Data: Kaiser Family Foundation, The Cook Political Report; Notes: Those losing insurance includes 2020 ACA marketplace enrollment and 2019 Medicaid expansion enrollment among newly-eligible enrollees. Close races are those defined as "Toss up" or "Lean R/D"; Table: Andrew Witherspoon/Axios

The sudden uncertainty surrounding the future of the Affordable Care Act could be an enormous political liability for Republicans in key states come November.

Between the lines: Millions of people in crucial presidential and Senate battlegrounds would lose their health care coverage if the Supreme Court strikes down the law, as the Trump administration is urging it to.

The chart above shows the number of people enrolled in the ACA's insurance marketplaces or covered through its Medicaid expansion.

  • These options have become especially important over the last six months, as millions of Americans lost their jobs — and thus their employer insurance — due to the pandemic.
  • And more than a quarter of non-elderly Americans have a pre-existing condition that insurers in the individual market could refuse to cover without the ACA, per the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The big picture: Republicans paid a steep electoral price for trying to repeal parts of the ACA in 2017. Republicans' lawsuit against the health care law, if it succeeds, would boot even more people off of their coverage and undo even more of the ACA's regulations.

What to watch: Several vulnerable Republicans, including Sens. Susan Collins, Martha McSally, and Cory Gardner,, represent purple states that expanded Medicaid and would therefore see steep coverage losses. And the broader fight over the Supreme Court has made it impossible to ignore those stakes.

  • "With the Court setting Nov 10 as the date for hearing California v. Texas, Republicans caught a break not having it front and center right before the election.  Now it is very much front and center," said Rodney Whitlock, a former health aide for Sen. Chuck Grassley.
  • "Debates over protection of pre-existing conditions have generally not gone positively for Republicans in purple states/district," he added.

Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times

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Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.

Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.

The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.

  • The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.

What the transcripts say:

  • Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
  • The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
  • Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."

Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.