Barack Obama Offers Blistering Takedown Of GOP Obstructionism In Pitch For Health Care Law

Obama spoke at Miami Dade College; later Thursday, he was scheduled to attend a Clinton campaign rally and an event for the Democratic Governors Association.

The president repeatedly referenced the Affordable Care Act’s heritage as a conservative policy ? including the 2006 Massachusetts law enacted by then-Gov. Mitt Romney (R) ? and upbraided the GOP for the party’s single-mindedness about repealing the ACA, its portrayal of the law as a threat to American society and its failure to propose a workable alternative since this debate began in 2009.

“Early on, Republicans just decided to oppose it, and then they tried to scare people with all kinds of predictions,” Obama said, citing claims that law would destroy the job market, completely take over the health care system, ration medical care and establish “death panels” to deny treatments to the sick. Obama also faulted Republicans in state governments for impeding the law’s implementation or, at least, not facilitating enrollment of uninsured people.

“They just can’t admit that a lot of good things have happened and the bad things they predicted didn’t happen,” Obama said “So they just keep on repeating, ‘We’re going to repeal it. We’re going to repeal it and replace it something better,’ even though six and a half years later, they still haven’t shown us what it is that they would do that would be better.”

The three-month open enrollment period on HealthCare.gov and the state-run health insurance exchange marketplaces begins Nov. 1, and the effort faces significant headwinds. Premium increases for next year are considerably higher than during the first three years of exchange sign-ups, and health insurers quitting some marketplaces has significantly diminished competition, especially in states where only one insurance provider is participating in the exchanges.  

On Wednesday, the Department of Health and Human Services announced it expects enrollment to grow by just 1.1 million people between 2016 and 2017, reaching a total of 13.8 million.

Obama conceded ? as he has before ? that despite the successes of the ACA, affordability and lack of insurance remains a problem for a segment of the population. “There are going to be people who are hurt by premium increases or a lack of competition and choice. And I don’t want to see anybody left out without health insurance,” he said.