Hickenlooper Launches Plan to Fight for a Healthier Future for All Coloradans

John Hickenlooper announced his “Plan to Fight for a Healthier Future for All Coloradans.” This multipronged health care policy addresses building on the Affordable Care Act, saving Coloradans money on health care, responding to COVID-19, prioritizing public health, focusing on equity, and investing in our future.
 
Hickenlooper’s commitment to and record of expanding access to health care stands in clear contrast to Senator Gardner who has voted repeatedly to repeal the Affordable Care Act and its lifesaving protections for people with preexisting conditions.
 
In the introduction to this plan, Hickenlooper wrote:
 
Health care is a right, not a privilege. No matter where you live, who you are, or how much you earn, you deserve high-quality, affordable health care. As a nation, we have repeatedly fallen short of this aspiration.
 
Unlike Senator Cory Gardner, I believe universal coverage is possible—and necessary. As governor, I expanded Medicaid to an additional 400,000 Coloradans. I also established our successful state exchange, Connect for Health Colorado, which allowed individuals to compare plans for quality and affordability. In the process, we cut the uninsured rate by nearly two-thirds. All told, 500,000 Coloradans got health insurance due to the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in our state, and we reached nearly ninety-five percent coverage statewide.
 
No doubt, we still have challenges to address, and COVID-19 has exposed how fragile our health care system really is. We should be outraged that people of color are more likely to die from COVID-19 than white Americans. We should be outraged that nurses are wearing trash bags to work because their hospital has run out of PPE. We should be outraged that overwhelmed labs can take over 14 days to return a test, rendering the result essentially meaningless. And we should be outraged that Washington Republicans have presaged this failure by proposing over 70 measures to repeal the ACA, rather than addressing the cracks in the system that are all too apparent.
 
Senator Gardner has voted at least a dozen times to repeal, block, or defund the ACA and could gut protections for people with pre-existing conditions. He supports President Trump’s U.S. Supreme Court lawsuit that could overturn the law in the middle of a pandemic. He doesn’t have a plan to protect access to health care. So I’m offering mine.
 
As your senator, I will fight every day to improve access to quality care. I will protect coverage for pre-existing conditions. I will fight to cut the cost of prescription drugs. I will expand mental health and substance misuse recovery services. And I will strengthen our vital social safety net programs including CHIP, Medicare, and Medicaid. More equitable, affordable, accessible health care is possible. COVID-19 has exposed how far we have to go to realize this goal. Time to get to work.
 
You can read Hickenlooper’s “Plan to Fight for a Healthier Future for All Coloradans” HERE.