First of all, his bill wouldn't do *anything* unless the #ACA is struck down...which he's repeatedly voted to do and still wants to do.
Secondly, his bill wouldn't do anything *in Colorado* even if the #ACA is struck down because it duplicates existing state law.
Most importantly, his bill would cause premiums for individual market insurance policies to become INSANELY unaffordable, since it includes no financial subsidies or price-gouging protection *and* it does nothing to keep or replace the #ACA's Medicaid expansion provision.
His bill also doesn't include any minimum actuarial value requirement, no caps on out of pocket expenses and a return to annual & lifetime coverage limits. Young adults could no longer stay on their parents plans until age 26 unless your state happens to require it, and so on.
For instance, the orange section here shows what percent of household income a typical family of 4 living in Henrico County, VA has to pay for a benchmark Silver plan (w/#ACA's protections) today (ignore the blue section for now):
Now, the #ACA does have problems; one is that the financial subsidies don't go *far enough*...that's why you see that big spike right at 400% of the Federal Poverty Level (around $105,000/year for a family of 4). That's what the House Dem's #ACA2.0 bill would solve. HOWEVER...
...let's take a look at how much an individual market insurance policy for this same family would cost *without* the #ACA* and under @CoryGardner's bill (roughly):
(this isn't exact, because in Virginia specifically, the children would qualify for Medicaid/CHIP up to 200% FPL; the parents would qualify up to 49% FPL, which is why there's still a narrow slice at the very left side...but you get the idea).
🧵 People have asked me why I started an organized project to raise money *directly* for Democratic candidates up & down the ballot when there's already so many other organizations out there doing this. There's a couple of reasons. 1/
The first is that most of the existing organizations/PACs/etc seem to (in my view) *either* focus ONLY on the true swing districts *or* they raise money for races which are clearly unwinnable without being up front about how long the odds in those races are. 2/
I try to walk the line between these--for district-level races I cast my net wider than most "tossup only!" advocates, but not absurdly wide; for statewide races I *do* include deep red states but also make it absolutely clear that those races are *very* long shots. 3/
A little fun Die Hard trivia for those who don’t know:
The first Die Hard was based on a 1979 novel called Nothing Lasts Forever by Roderick Thorp. In the novel McClain’s character was named Joe Leland. This was a sequel to a 1966 novel by Thorp called The Detective. 1/
The Detective had been made into a film starring Frank Sinatra as Joe Leland in 1968.
This means Bruce Willis plays the same character as Frank Sinatra.
In fact, the studio was contractually required to offer the role to Sinatra if he wanted it. Sinatra was 73 at the time.
As for the novel Nothing Lasts Forever (title since changed to “Die Hard”), it follows most of the same storyline and characters, but with a few VERY important differences…
How does the @nytimes know that these are actual federal officials who actually signed it if they did so “anonymously?”
Does that mean the Times is redacting their names? Or does it just say “signed, 400 officials” at the bottom of the letter?
@nytimes I’m not being snarky here—I can’t read the original NY Times article without a subscription; do they clarify how they verified that these 400 people actually are federal officials and that they did in fact sign off on the letter in it?
1. DON'T DELAY; #GETCOVERED BY *DECEMBER 15th* IF POSSIBLE!
#ACA Open Enrollment officially runs from 11/01/23 - 1/16/24, but if you want your coverage to start in JANUARY you only have until December 15th in most states!
Here's a table of the deadlines & when coverage starts for every state +DC (some may be extended at the last minute):