Dear Editor:
We all hate political ads, and rarely is what you hear in any political ad entirely true. But in terms of lies in political ads, the ad currently running in which Jeff Hurd claims to be lowering our health care costs has to be an all-time record bald-faced lie. The truth is totally the opposite of what the ad claims. Jeff Hurd cast the deciding vote for Trump’s Big Ugly Bill. This bill included drastic cuts to Medicaid, but he voted for it even though a higher-than-average percentage of his constituents are insured by Medicaid. He also voted against extending the now-expired expanded subsidies under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and then cast the deciding vote for the Big Ugly Bill that allowed those subsidies to expire. Together, the cuts that Hurd supported to Medicaid and the ACA will make health care dramatically more expensive for hundreds of thousands of Coloradans. And the House vote for these cuts to our health care would have failed had it not been for Jeff Hurd, because the bill passed by a margin of one vote. Inevitably, the result of the cuts will be that many thousands of Hurd’s constituents will lose health coverage altogether. Others will pay much more than they are paying now or were last year. Some of the cuts were cleverly scheduled to occur after the upcoming election, so if your health insurance costs have not gone up yet, they very likely will in a couple of months. In short, Hurd put what Trump wanted ahead of the health care needs of his own constituents.
This doesn’t just affect individual Coloradans; it also impacts our hospitals. They will have less income, more uninsured patients, and more emergency room visits. All of this means a big hit in the budget of our hospitals, particularly rural hospitals like Pagosa Springs Medical Center. Yes, Hurd voted for Trump’s band-aid bill to provide some additional funding to rural hospitals, but this funding does not come anywhere close to covering the increased costs and reduced revenue that hospitals will face because of his votes on the ACA subsidies and Medicaid. So any claim that Hurd is reducing your health care costs is nothing but a big fat lie.
Fortunately, we have an election coming up. By voting for Dwayne Romero for the US House of Representatives, we can have a congressman who will vote to protect our health care and truly make it affordable – just the opposite of what Jeff Hurd has in fact done. Please vote for Dwayne Romero.
John Farley
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