Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden echoed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) in criticizing President Trump by accusing him of “trying to throw out the Affordable Care Act” with his rushed nomination of conservative Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, during a campaign event on Sunday.
Earlier Sunday, a day after officially nominating Barrett, Trump boasted in a tweet that the Affordable Care Act “will be replaced with a MUCH better, and FAR cheaper alternative, if it is terminated in the Supreme Court.”
Pelosi told CNN on Sunday that the President is in a “hurry” to confirm his Barrett — a favorite among the right-wing and religious conservatives for her views on abortion and health care — in order to invalidate the Affordable Care Act, given how the court is set to hear a case on the ACA just days after the November presidential election. Both Pelosi and Senate Minority Speaker Chuck Schumer (D-NY) warned that Barrett’s nomination could threaten access to health care as well as other consequential policy issues.
During his campaign event speech in Wilmington, Delaware on Sunday, Biden echoed Pelosi’s and Schumer’s sentiments in warning about the threat that the ACA faces in light of Trump nominating Barrett to fill the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat.
“It’s no mystery about what’s happening here,” Biden said. “President Trump is trying to throw out the Affordable Care Act. He’s been trying to do it for the last four years. The Republican Party has been trying to eliminate it for a decade.”
Biden then tore into Trump by saying that “it doesn’t matter what the American people want” to the President.
“President Trump sees a chance to fulfill his explicit mission: Steal away the vital protections of the ACA from countless families who have come to rely on them for their health, their financial security and the lives of those they love, Biden said.”
Biden also said that there’s “no surprise” that Trump nominated Barrett, citing the President’s tweet earlier Sunday that “lays out clearly what his objective is: to terminate Obamacare.”
The former VP then pointed to Barrett’s “written track record of disagreeing adamantly” with the Supreme Court’s rulings that have upheld the Affordable Care Act.
“The American people understand the urgency of this moment,” Biden said. “They’re already voting in droves because they know their health care hangs in the balance.”
Watch Biden’s remarks below:
