Stirred by Sanders, Democrats shift to the left on health care
Clinton wants to build on Obamacare
WASHINGTON — More Democrats seem to be having doubts about the federal health care law, a contentious issue for most of President Barack Obama’s tenure and one of the defining elements of his legacy.
With the administration counting down its final year, Sen. Bernie Sanders’ call for “Medicare for all” appears to have rekindled aspirations for more ambitious changes beyond Obamacare.
That poses a challenge for Hillary Clinton, who has argued that the health care law is working and the nation should build on it, not start over.
Two recent polls have shown an uptick in negative ratings for the Affordable Care Act, or ACA, and the shift seems to come from Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents. For example, in the latest installment of the Kaiser Family Foundation health care poll, the share of Democrats with unfavorable views increased by 6 percentage points.
Underlying the unease seems to be a growing conviction that the law did not do enough. About 27 million people remain uninsured and many who gained coverage find it costly. Kaiser found that, for the first time, a 51-percent majority of Democrats wants to expand what the law does, a sharp increase from the 36 percent who said so in December.
The health care law was a good start, “but it doesn’t do all the things we need to have done,” said Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Wash.
“I think frankly Bernie’s campaign has stirred it up,” he added. A longtime advocate of coverage for all, McDermott is supporting Clinton.
Democrats’ shifting views could make things tricky for Clinton if she’s picked as the nominee over Sanders, which appears likely. Clinton established her commitment to covering the uninsured long ago, during the losing battle for health care legislation in her husband’s administration.
Going into the 2016 primary season, she cast herself as the candidate of continuity, promising to defend Obama’s health care accomplishments from repeal by Republicans.
Lately, she’s been stressing changes she’d make to increase coverage, make it more affordable and even encourage states to experi- ment with government-sponsored alternatives to private health insurance, as Colorado is debating.
“She can’t have so many people who are not excited about something and say ‘I’m going to continue it for eight more years,’” said Robert Blendon, a professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, who follows public opinion on health care.
Overall, Democrats still support the Obama health care law by broad margins, especially if the alternative is repealing it. But the nonpartisan polls released last week registered surprising movement.
A Pew Research Center poll found that, overall, the public disapproves of the law by 54-44 percent, a change from last summer when it found Americans almost evenly divided. Part of the explanation was a 12-point drop in support among Democratic-leaning independents.