Chris Smith Won't Fight For Our Healthcare

A recent article in the local press portrays Chris Smith as ambivalent about the Affordable Care Act, (Obamacare), and fails to present any of Smith’s history on the law. These omissions deny voters crucial information they need before the election.

In November, the Supreme Court will hear a Republican-led challenge to the ACA. There is now a very real possibility of losing the ACA if Amy Coney Barrett, Trump’s latest nominee to the Supreme Court, is confirmed.

In addition to bringing healthcare to 23 million Americans and controlling costs, the ACA also guarantees coverage for preexisting conditions and establishes essential benefits that must be offered in insurance plans such as maternal and newborn care, emergency services, hospitalization, prescription drugs, mental health and substance use disorder services, laboratory services, and pediatric services including oral and vision care. It also allows young people to remain on their parents insurance plans until they are 26 years old and guarantees no-cost birth control coverage.

This is a lot to lose. If voters have a full picture of Smith’s history with the ACA, they will realize that they cannot rely on him to claw back these protections from his seat in Congress if the ACA is nullified in court.

How do we know? Let’s look at Smith's record:
Smith opposed the ACA for years, irresponsibly voted for a full repeal without a replacement numerous times, and offered only a quiet statement while his party came within one vote of repeal in 2017. This June, with millions of Americans losing job-based insurance due to COVID, Smith voted against expanding the ACA.

Smith has also said the following about the law:
“There is no doubt whatsoever that senior citizens and disabled persons will lose certain health benefits they now enjoy.”

“Obamacare is a crippling blow to both healthcare in America and our economy. Not only will Obamacare erode and undermine the quality of healthcare in America, it will...drag down the economy, hurt businesses, and destroy jobs.”

“Government bureaucrats may construe a patient's age, prognosis and medical outcome as factors precluding coverage of a vast array of services, from knee and hip replacements to expensive interventions to combat cancer.” (This is a coy reference to “death panels.”)
The ACA would lead to “the end of employer-based healthcare. It will also lead to a significant degrading of healthcare delivery in our country.”

The ACA would erode Medicaid by “threatening the participation of physicians in the program.”
None of this happened.

In their decade-long quest to destroy the ACA, neither Smith nor the GOP have been able to produce a healthcare plan that doesn’t result in millions of Americans losing their insurance. We should expect nothing different now.

Fortunately, voters in New Jersey’s Fourth Congressional District don’t have to rely on Smith to protect their healthcare.

Stephanie Schmid is challenging Smith for his seat. Stephanie supports a healthcare plan which automatically enrolls uninsured or underinsured individuals in a safety-net program while allowing people to keep their private plans. This way, households won’t go broke over medical bills or end up uninsured when a family member is unemployed. Stephanie will work to expand healthcare access, not reduce it or sit silently while others try to rip it away from millions of Americans.

If the Supreme Court dismantles the ACA, a huge fight over the future of healthcare in America will follow. Make no mistake: your healthcare is on the ballot. When choosing who you want in that fight, choose someone who will advocate for your family with her voice and her vote.

Elect Stephanie Schmid.