Just as the Trump administration was asking the Supreme Court to toss out Obamacare, Politifact was out yesterday with a new assessment of appointed Sen. Martha McSally’s claim in a recent ad that she “will always protect people with preexisting conditions. Always.”
Yesterday, PolitiFact rated that claim, based on McSally’s own voting record, as “false.”
You can read the details here, but here’s the central takeaway:
In her new TV ad, McSally claims she will “always protect those with preexisting conditions.”
But nothing in her voting record, which tracks closely with the Republican repeal-and-replace philosophy, supports this claim. And she has continually declined opportunities to oppose a pending legal threat to the ACA, including its provisions related to preexisting conditions, by a group of GOP governors and supported by the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, the legislation her campaign cited to justify her stance falls short in terms of meaningfully protecting Americans with preexisting medical conditions.
McSally has not in the past or present taken actions that back up her statement. We rate it False.
McSally has been trying to rewrite her history on Obamacare for years now. In 2018, she admitted that she was getting killed on the healthcare issue, mainly because of her voting record: She has repeatedly voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which protects people with pre-existing conditions. In fact, she urged her fellow House members to repeal it in 2017 with the cry of “Let’s get this fucking thing done”—a quote she celebrated in her Senate campaign ads in 2018.
As much as McSally likes to point to bills that haven’t gone anywhere as examples of how she supports preventing insurance companies from discriminating against people with pre-existing conditions, her efforts to get rid of the one thing that prevents said discrimination flies in the face of her claim that she’s committed to “always” protecting those with pre-existing conditions.
The PolitiFact “false” rating comes the same week as the Trump administration’s filing of legal arguments asking the Supreme Court to toss Obamacare—based on that big ol’ deficit-doubling tax cut bill supported by McSally that eliminated the penalty for not having health insurance. McSally has repeatedly declined to oppose the lawsuit to toss Obamacare, saying it’s none of her business. Again, her actions doesn’t sound like she will “always” protect those with pre-existing conditions.
In fact, the Trump administration said in legal filing that McSally, along with the other Republicans who voted in favor of the bill, knew that they were also repealing the Affordable Care Act. As the Washington Post reports:
The Trump team’s core argument is that every Republican who voted for the tax cuts three years ago knowingly voted to destroy the 2010 law in its entirely, not just to get rid of the mandate that individuals buy health insurance. And, because the Supreme Court previously upheld the constitutionality of the law on the grounds that the individual mandate is a tax, Trump’s lawyers say that the whole system became invalid once Congress got rid of the penalty for not carrying health insurance.
“Nothing the 2017 Congress did demonstrates it would have intended the rest of the ACA to continue to operate in the absence of these … integral provisions,” Francisco writes in his brief, which is co-signed by four other Trump appointees at the Justice Department. “The entire ACA thus must fall with the individual mandate.”
Democrat Mark Kelly, the former astronaut who has been leading McSally in the polls, said today that stripping protections from people with pre-existing conditions is a terrible idea, especially in a pandemic.
“Arizona is battling the coronavirus and the last thing we need is for millions of Arizonans with pre-existing conditions to lose their health care protections,” said Kelly in a prepared statement. “As more Arizonans are getting sick and many more lose their jobs and health insurance, we have to make sure all Arizonans can get the testing and health care they need to protect public health and slow the spread of the virus. That’s what our leaders should be working on, not this partisan effort that would throw hundreds of thousands of Arizonans off of their health plans, harm Arizonans with pre-existing conditions, and make our fight against this virus more difficult.”
This article appears in Jun 25 – Jul 1, 2020.
Not near as bad as 10,000 dollar deductibles. It’s just like having no coverage at all.
Mendacious Martha once again shows that she’s a tower of integrity. Though to be fair, she’s no different than the rest of her party.
Apparently, we have entered a new realm of American politics where they don’t even try to hide the lies.
No more trying to have deniable plausibility, misunderstandings, misquotes or being taken out of context. They just lie and continue to lie as if the lie has a magical power over reality, facts and records.
What’s a voter to do?
Simple, follow the money. Whether it is given by PACs, political parties, corporations or special interest groups, the key to any politician’s behavior is to ignore what they say and follow the money to determine the underlying motivations.
I realize this is a cynical view of modern politics, but to do otherwise is to imagine that politicians’ actions are motivated by moral, ethical and altruistic behaviors that better belong to narratives that begin with “Once upon a time” and end with “and they lived happily ever after.”
After being subjected to the trashy videos on YouTube and watching photo ops with Donald Trump, I have concluded that McSally and the current president share the same foul-smelling bathwater. Time soon to throw both of these out the window onto the trash heap of history. They do not share anything valuable to benefit the future of America beyond personal accusations, political gossip and shameless self-promotion. They do share a lack of, and even a disregard for, a coherent governing philosophy that serves as an organizing principle for a major political party. The Republicans have Trump and are Trump, and beyond his cult of personality the cupboard is bare.
As John Bolton just confirmed, Trump is nothing but a dictator-loving traitor who is more than willing to throw America’s interests under the bus to advance his own personal gain. This mainstream Republican Party has chosen to March along the dangerous path of Trumpism. The fact that McSally chooses to associate herself with such a treasonous narcissistic sociopath can mean only one of two things: either she is a true believer of this phony fascistic ideology of Trumpism, which I find hard to believe, or she is a weak-minded obedient drone to her Republican masters.
Arizonians want their Senators to be honest and of good moral character; Martha is neither!
Vote Blue, not only is the Vulgar Talking Yam “willing to throw America’s interests under the bus…”, he looks the other way when his pal Putin offers to pay bounties to Afghan militants to kill American troops. Even after being briefed about it last March he refused to bring it up in subsequent conversations with Putin:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/j…
Way to support our troops Benedict Donald!
Not vote blue no matter what. Unless biden puts stacy abrams on the ticket I will vote green again. As for mcsally I have a choice of her or the stooge of the communist chinese who will help biden sell out the working class to china for $$$! What a country.
So Mark Kelly, NASA astronaut and ex-Navy fighter pilot, is a communist stooge? I think its important to put some things in historical perspective Captain. The “Neoliberal” economic policies that caused the outsourcing of manufacturing jobs throughout the 80’s, 90’s and 00’s; those are all rooted in Milton Friedman school of thought. The Milton Friedman school of thought is the basis of everything Reagonomics. Yes, there was a time back in the 90’s when Bill Clinton’s democratic party had jumped on the “Free Trade” laissez-faire bandwagon, but the conservative movement was/is the main engine behind the gutting of US manufacturing.
Both sides of the aisle never stopped the sucking sound of jobs leaving to seek cheap labor. Clinton, GHW Bush were on watch during the the majority of those losses. Similarly, a huge difference between free and fair trade, Allowing China and Western Europe access to our markets without demanding the same for American Industry. Like the saying about accepting that the smartest thing Satan did was making people believe he doesn’t exist, which I don’t, is that the Democrats are for the middle class and blue collar workers. Both Libs and conservatives fulfilled their promises to the corporations who fund reelection campaigns are guilty.
I hope people realize that having been tested positive for Covid will now also be a preexisting condition. One more reason to Vote Blue and hopefully avoid Martha’s attempts to eliminate coverage for this vulnerable population.