FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 23, 2023
Big Sky 55+ Celebrates 13th Anniversary of Affordable Care Act, Calls for Universal Affordable Coverage to Finish the Job
Montana - On the 13th anniversary of the Affordable Care Act becoming law, Big Sky 55+ released the following statement celebrating record enrollment and lowered costs gained through the Inflation Reduction Act, and calling on Congress to finish the job so everyone has access to affordable coverage:
“After 13 years of non-stop attacks and sabotage from opponents, the Affordable Care Act has not only survived but thrived, hitting record enrollment in 2023 by providing quality, affordable coverage to more than 53,860 Montanans and improving coverage for more than 100 million Americans nationwide. Both the ACA and Medicaid were invaluable tools throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, ensuring individuals could get affordable coverage when they needed it most. But it shouldn’t take an emergency to make healthcare affordable and accessible to millions more people: Congress has the power to make permanent the increased affordability provisions and Medicaid improvements that have brought the number of uninsured people to record lows over the last year.
We support President Biden’s recently announced budget blueprint to do just that by:
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making enhanced premium tax credits permanent in the ACA;
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increasing investment in Medicaid to address the current mental health and substance abuse crisis, and provide home based and community care options to aging people and people with disabilities; and
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extending provisions to lower drug prices beyond Medicare so that people of all ages can get affordable prescription drugs.
Reining in the health industry’s price-gouging, and raising taxes on billionaires and tax-dodging corporations is a common sense solution to lowering costs while investing in services.
It’s a better approach than Republican proposals to cut spending on Medicaid, Medicare and the ACA, extend the Trump tax cuts for the wealthy, and repeal the benefits under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Rep. Rosendale and Rep. Zinke are both co-sponsors of the bill to repeal the IRA. Through the IRA, President Biden has already lowered out-of-pocket costs and prescription drug prices in Medicare by taking on drug corporations and insulin manufacturers, saving Montanans an average of $990 and expanding coverage to about 10,000 Montanans who would otherwise be uninsured. We thank Sen. Jon Tester for being a champion on this issue.
It’s time to finish the job of ensuring that everyone in America has access to quality, affordable health care. By taxing corporations that make billions in profits, we can lower healthcare costs for people of all ages, fund mental health care, increase access to treatments for substance use disorders, support rural hospitals and expand home health care, all while reducing the deficit. Big Sky 55+ calls on all of Montana's Federal delegation to support the President’s plan to expand health care coverage and lower costs by finally making corporations and the very wealthy pay their fair share in taxes.”