In November, Florida’s desire for quality healthcare will be on the ballot, too | Opinion

President Trump and his enablers have picked the worst possible time to double down on their crusade against our healthcare system.

As the COVID-19 pandemic rages across our country and cases are spiking here in Florida, Trump wants to strip healthcare coverage from almost 2 million Floridians who get their insurance through the Affordable Care Act.

This is not just campaign rhetoric. Florida’s attorney general and Republican officials from other states have gone to the Supreme Court to roll back this landmark legislation. Instead of defending a law that provides the insurance coverage that so many vulnerable people depend on, Trump and his Justice Department are tearing it down.

These attacks are unacceptable during normal times and reprehensible during a pandemic. I’ve seen the Trump administration fail to deliver for the families of Florida’s 27th district time and time again. It’s now more clear than ever: we must elect my friend, Joe Biden.

Let’s look at the facts: Florida has the highest enrollment of any state in the country of people who get their health insurance from exchanges. Almost 20 percent of South Floridians are enrolled in health-insurance plans made possible by the Obama-Biden administration. My own district has the country’s highest enrollment in the ACA, with almost 100,000 people receiving their healthcare through this vital legislation.

It was Vice President Biden who worked with Congress to get the Affordable Care Act across the line in the first place. He was standing next to President Obama when the law was signed in March 2010. As Biden noted at the time, it was a big deal.

That breakthrough was decades in the making. It meant that Americans no longer had to worry that an insurance company would deny them coverage or burden them with enormous premiums because of preexisting medical conditions.

It meant that young people could stay on their parents’ insurance plan until they were 26 years old as they sought to get a foothold in the workplace..

It meant insurance companies could no longer place lifetime limits on the benefits patients received.

During the Obama-Biden administration, the number of Americans who lacked health insurance dropped from more than 44 million to 27 million, an unprecedented 40 percent drop.

Now, Biden has a plan to protect and expand that legislation.

His plan would allow Americans who do not have insurance or think their insurance companies are not giving them a fair shake the opportunity to opt in to a Medicare-like public option.

Coverage for low-income Americans would be expanded. Florida’s governor has refused to expand Medicaid, ignoring the views of an overwhelming number of Floridians. So Biden will offer them premium-free access to this new public option.

Millions of other Americans will have their premiums lowered through expanded tax credits under his plan.

And what is President Trump offering? He has been obsessed with dismantling the Affordable Care Act, which Americans have come to value and rely on, without developing a credible plan to establish in its place.

The numbers tell the story. Under Trump, the number of uninsured Americans has already grown by 1.4 million as his administration has picked apart aspects of the law.

That’s not the direction our country needs to go, especially as we experience a surge in COVID-19 infections. But it is not surprising that Trump has gone down this path. The president downplayed the dangers of COVID-19, which is hitting Hispanics and other minorities the hardest, as it continues to spread across South Florida.

It was Trump who boasted recently in Tulsa that he had told his staff to slow down testing for COVID-19 because he thought the rising count of ill Americans would hurt his campaign. It was also Trump who held another rally in Arizona that ignored advice from his own government’s health experts on the importance of facial coverings and social distancing and tuned out local officials’ concerns.

The pattern is clear: President Trump cares more about politics than the health of his fellow Americans. We must demand better in November. Join me in voting for Joe Biden.

Donna Shalala, D-Miami, represents Florida’s 27th congressional district in the U.S. House.