Ahead of Confirmation Vote on Amy Coney Barrett, Senators Carper, Coons Join Patients and Providers to Highlight #WhatsAtStake for Delawareans if Affordable Care Act is Overturned

WILMINGTON, Del. – Today, just hours before the U.S. Senate is scheduled to vote on Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the Supreme Court, U.S. Senators Tom Carper and Chris Coons (both D-Del.) joined Delawareans who are benefitting from the Affordable Care Act (ACA) to highlight what’s at stake if the landmark health care law is overturned. Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to serve on the Supreme Court threatens the health care protections that millions of Americans currently have under the ACA, including protections for the nearly 400,000 Delawareans living with preexisting conditions.

Today, at Westside Family Healthcare in Wilmington, Senators Carper and Coons were joined by Delawareans who have directly benefitted from the protections under the ACA, including the ban on annual and lifetime limits for essential health benefits. “It’s hard enough to fight the cancer. We shouldn’t also have to fight to live,” said Jan White, a small business owner from Newark who has been battling Stage 4 Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma for four years. “We need the ACA protections.”

“The ACA is not just benefiting me but thousands of Delawareans and millions of Americans all across this country,” said Carrie Dennis-Mayer, a small business owner from Middletown. “What is interesting is that most people do not know the need for the Affordable Care Act until they really need it. And if you fall between the cracks of healthcare insecurity and healthcare uncertainty, then trust me, you’re grateful that ACA is there to help you.”

“Having failed nearly 100 times to repeal or chip away at the Affordable Care Act in Congress, Donald Trump and many of our Republican colleagues are now counting on the Supreme Court to do their work for them. And, with Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination, they are within one vote on the Supreme Court of achieving their goal,” said Senator Carper. “This isn’t a hypothetical. This nomination – and a subsequent ruling on the Republican lawsuit to strike down the ACA in its entirety – could have all too real and devastating consequences for Delawareans like Jan and our entire health care system, all in the midst of a deadly and unprecedented pandemic. It is shameful, and Senator Coons and I won’t stop fighting to make sure Americans know just how much is at stake here.”

“It is amazing to me, galling to me, angering to me, that in the middle of a pandemic – a global health pandemic that has killed more than 225,000 Americans and infected more than 8,500,000 Americans – that the Trump administration is seeking to take away the protections of the Affordable Care Act from a majority of Americans,” said Senator Coons, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “Don’t take my word for it; there’s a filing in the U.S. Supreme Court in a case that will be argued one week from the election. So, we are one week from an election and two weeks from an argument in the Supreme Court where the ACA is at risk.”

Even in the midst of a pandemic that has taken over 225,000 American lives, President Trump has repeatedly vowed to repeal the ACA and even urged the Supreme Court to strike down the health care law. Just last night, in an interview with 60 Minutes, President Trump plainly stated that he hopes that Supreme Court ends the ACA. Unfortunately, if Judge Amy Coney Barrett is confirmed by the U.S. Senate, she could cast the deciding vote to overturn the ACA. Just one week after the election – on November 10^th – the United States Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in a case brought by the Trump Administration and 18 Republican Attorneys General that would overturn the Affordable Care Act in its entirety.

You can watch video of the event here.