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Axelrod: I cried when they passed Obamacare - CNN - CNN.com
www.cnn.com/2017/09/21/...cried-when-they-passed-obamacare-axelrod/index.html
Axelrod: I cried when they passed Obamacare
Story highlights
- David Axelrod: When ACA passed, I was reminded of my daughter's struggle with epilepsy and high cost of her medical care
- The new GOP health-care bill would plunge many Americans into the same situation my family was in, he writes
David Axelrod is a CNN commentator and host of the podcast "The Axe Files," now a regularly featured show on CNN. He was senior adviser to President Barack Obama and chief strategist for the 2008 and 2012 Obama campaigns. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his.
(CNN)I wept the night the Affordable Care Act passed.
Through
my closed office door in the White House, I could hear President Obama
and my colleagues cheer as the final tally came in from the House of
Representatives that, at long last, would send the ACA to his desk. But I
wasn't there. Sensing my emotions welling, I had excused myself from
the gathering in the Roosevelt Room as the votes mounted and walked
across the hall to be alone and collect my thoughts.
This
unexpected burst confused me. I had, after all, been involved in many
public battles over the course of my career. So why was I sobbing now?
Proud
as I was, I knew it wasn't because of the prodigious political
accomplishment the president had just achieved, some over-the-top
elation because my boss had notched a historic victory. It was much more
personal: My thoughts were focused on my own experience in the health
care system, as the father of a child with a chronic illness.
Tension on Senate floor amid health care fight 01:37
When
my daughter, Lauren, was 7 months old, my wife found her gray and limp
in her crib. Susan, at first, thought our beautiful little baby had
died. But soon, Lauren stirred. One arm shot into the air and stiffened,
her eyes rolled back in her head and she began frothing at the mouth.
Lauren
had epilepsy. This seizure was one of thousands she would experience
over the next 18 years. She lived through more than a dozen
hospitalizations, brutal, failed treatments and brain surgery before we
were able to find a combination of drugs to stop them.
I
was a young reporter at the Chicago Tribune when Lauren got sick and we
had insurance through my job. But that insurance didn't cover Lauren's
very expensive medications and, since she now had a pre-existing
condition, we couldn't shift to a policy that would. Our out-of-pocket
expenses ran as much as a thousand dollars a month. My salary at the
time was around $40,000 a year.
All
those memories came rushing back the night the ACA passed -- all the
pain and financial worry we had felt as young parents, struggling to
keep our baby alive. I cried because I knew that because of the law that
had passed that evening, many other families would not have to face the
same ordeal.
Once
I collected myself, I found the president to thank him on their behalf.
He simply put his hand on my shoulder and said, "That's why we do the
work."
Since that time, I have encountered so many Americans who have been helped by this law who felt moved to give their testimony.
There
was the young, hairless man in a baseball cap who stopped me on the
street in Chicago. He obtained insurance as a result of the ACA and
shortly after, was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a potentially
deadly form of cancer.
"I wouldn't
have gone for a checkup without insurance," he said, his own eyes
brimming with tears. "And I couldn't have covered the treatment."
I
recalled that encounter recently at a conference at which I was
speaking. After the talk, a young couple chased me down in the parking
lot.
"That's my story," the young
woman said with tears of her own. "I had cancer and without the ACA we
would be bankrupt -- or I would be dead. Maybe both."
Wherever
I go in the country, I encounter such stories. Some from patients
themselves; often from grateful relatives and friends of those who have
benefited from the ACA.
I
can't remember anyone stopping me to share the "horror stories"
President Trump and the relentless proponents of "repeal and replace"
invoke, though I know there are some who had had bare-bones policies and
now are paying more for more coverage than they say they need. (I
didn't know what I needed until I needed it.)
Without
question, the law can be improved. Among the needed steps, additional
measures should be taken to stabilize rates in the private insurance
exchanges through which 3% of Americans buy their insurance. A
bipartisan group of senators was at work on such a plan before being
sideswiped by the latest frantic effort to dismantle Obamacare.
The
ACA has not only provided the opportunity for health coverage to tens
of millions who lacked it, it has afforded new benefits and protections
that make all Americans more secure. It has promoted preventive care and
innovations in the delivery of care that have strengthened our entire
health care system.
That is why
every major medical organization, disease and patient advocacy group --
even America's major insurers -- have strongly condemned the latest plan
from Senators Lindsey Graham and Bill Cassidy to scrap the ACA.
Under
the Graham-Cassidy plan, millions would lose coverage altogether. Rates
on older Americans would rise dramatically. And, though the bill
includes language that would continue to offer coverage to people with
pre-existing conditions, it does not require that it be provided at an
affordable price. It is an empty and cynical promise.
Paul: Graham-Cassidy not a repeal of Obamacare 01:55
Republican
and Democratic governors have rejected the plan, warning that its
draconian cuts in Medicaid funding over time would hurt their states.
Those cuts would threaten nursing home patients, people with
disabilities and those who need drug treatment, which is particularly
cruel in the midst of the opioid crisis. Insurers say the Graham-Cassidy
plan would wreak havoc in the insurance markets.
So
why visit all of this on the American people, racing yet another
repeal-and-replace bill through without proper hearings or scrutiny?
Because, says the president and Republican leadership in Congress,
"repeal and replace" was a promise made to their base and if Congress
fails again to act, it will depress Republican turnout in 2018. This
isn't about the health of Americans. It's about the health of the party.
I
remember accompanying President Obama to a closed Democratic Senate
caucus, where he made a passionate case for the ACA. He didn't make a
political argument. He knew he was asking the members to cast a risky
vote that could, and would, cost some of them their jobs.
Instead, he asked them for their votes because the ACA would improve the lives of many Americans.
"Remember
why it was we all ran for public office in the first place -- the
school board, or city council or legislature?" he asked, speaking
without a note in front of him. "We did it because we wanted to make a
positive difference in the lives of our communities and of people.
That's why we got into this work.
"Now
we have a chance to do something really meaningful -- something folks
in this town have been talking about since Roosevelt -- both Roosevelts
-- but have never gotten done.
"This is our moment. This is our chance to make a real difference now and for future generations."
What
a contrast with what we are watching today, a destructive bill, raced
through the Senate without proper reflection or scrutiny in order to
meet a September 30 deadline after which the rules would compel a
bipartisan answer on this life-and-death issue.
I wonder what case President Trump, Vice President Pence and Mitch McConnell are making behind closed doors today?
Are
they arguing that this law will somehow improve the lives of the
millions of Americans who will lose coverage? Or are they warning their
comrades of retribution from an angry base if they don't pay off on
their mantra of "repeal and replace?"
I will weep again if this retrograde and reprehensible bill becomes law.
I
won't weep because of some perceived blow to "the Obama legacy," any
more than I cried because of the political achievement seven years ago.
I'll cry for the sick and vulnerable and for all the families who will needlessly be exposed to the awful trials mine has known.
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