Election 2024: Harris highlights potential catastrophic impact of ACA repeal

In response to a WHYY News request for a response, Trump campaign national press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in an emailed statement, “President Trump is not running to repeal the Affordable Care Act.”

“He is committed to making health care truly affordable, as well as lowering inflation, cutting taxes, and loosening regulations to put more money into the pockets of all Americans robbed by Kamala Harris’ disastrous economic policies.” she added.

Donald Trump has long criticized the ACA — popularly known as “Obamacare” — since his first race for president.

“Obamacare must be repealed and replaced,” Trump told reporters in October 2016. “Otherwise, this country is in even more trouble than anyone imagined.”

Despite the 2012 Supreme Court ruling upholding the health care law as constitutional, Trump and Republicans in Congress made 33 attempts to repeal it up to and during his presidency – and managed to eliminate key components.

The ACA was immediately controversial when then-President Barack Obama introduced the bill, which Congress ultimately passed on a bipartisan basis. Nearly 15 years later, the Act to Reduce Overall Health Care Costs for Low-Income and Middle-Class Families remains popular with Americans.

Trump only promised to repeal it in January. During the presidential debate in Philadelphia with Vice President Kamala Harris earlier this month, Trump said he was working on “concepts for a plan” that would replace the ACA. During Vance’s visit to Newtown on Saturday, a reporter asked whether Vance would guarantee that, if elected, President Donald Trump and Vice President Vance would not repeal the ACA until they had a different health plan.

The vice presidential candidate did not respond, but said the country’s health care system needed more “transparency.”

The report also repeats the claim that Trump, who supported overturning Roe v. Wade blamed, would try to extend the abortion ban even to Pennsylvania. The campaign report adds that the investigation into the deaths of two women in Georgia was likely the result of that state’s strict abortion ban, and that an analysis shows an increase in maternal deaths in Texas following an abortion ban there.

This article has been updated to include the Trump campaign’s response, which was requested before publication.