Campaigns spar over health care coverage

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Richard Cordray contends that the health insurance of millions of Ohioans with pre- existing medical conditions is at risk in a Texas courtroom.

Cordray called Thursday for his opponent, Republican Attorney General Mike DeWine, to intervene in a federal lawsuit in a bid to save the mandate that health insurers sell policies to those with chronic conditions.

DeWine has no plans, though, a spokesman said, to involve Ohio in a legal action in which 20 Republican attorneys general seek to overturn the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, as unconstitutional since federal tax reform repealed the tax penalty for failing to DeWine Cordray

buy coverage.

Sixteen Democratic attorneys general have intervened in the lawsuit on the other side in a bid to save Obamacare.

The administration of Republican President Donald Trump is somewhat in the middle. In a filing last week, the U.S. Department of Justice said it would not defend attempts to overthrow the pre- existing conditions mandate. However, federal lawyers are defending other parts of the law, including the expansion of Medicaid coverage to the working poor.

“Mike DeWine’s silence on this lawsuit is a signal that he would take Ohio back to the days when a past sickness, chronic illness, or addiction could be used to deny health care,” Cordray said.

“As he prepares to take the stage with ( Vice President) Mike Pence, DeWine owes Ohioans an answer. Will he stand up for Ohioans’ health care, or will he sit back and watch as the Trump administration threatens to put health insurance beyond the reach of 4.8 million Ohioans, and raise costs for all the rest of us?”

DeWine campaign spokesman Joshua Eck said that DeWine “wants to ensure people with preexisting conditions have access to affordable health insurance,” but did not specify how that would be accomplished.

“Here we go again with Richard Cordray misleading Ohioans. He wants us to join Democrats in preserving Obamacare, including the individual mandate and the costs that come with it, which Mike DeWine has always opposed,” Eck said.

The attorney general’s office has no plans at this time to join the Texas lawsuit in any capacity, on either side, said spokesman Dan Tierney. “No state has made any filing similar to what Mr. Cordray is suggesting,” he said.

DeWine, whose most virulent opposition to the Affordable Care Act centered on the requirement that all Americans purchase health insurance or face a tax penalty, joined other Republicans fighting the law in court shortly after its inception, but lost before the U.S Supreme Court.

DeWine is scheduled to introduce Pence on Friday afternoon as the vice president speaks about tax cuts at a Downtown hotel. “Mike DeWine shouldn’t pat Mike Pence on the back, he should be calling him out,” said Betty Sutton, Cordray’s lieutenant governor running mate.

Before the Statehouse news conference, the Ohio Republican Party noted that some of Cordray’s supporters, such as Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, are advocates for single- payer or government-run universal health care coverage. Republicans contend such a system would require massive tax increases.

Asked if he supports or opposes single- payer coverage, Cordray, who narrowly lost his office as attorney general to DeWine in 2010, would only say “it’s not part of the law.”