Barely a Third of Democrat Congressional Candidates Support Obamacare

As we rapidly approach the one year anniversary of Obamacare's implementation and the horrendous launch of HealthCare.gov, a new report from the Brookings Institution shows that Democrat candidates for Congress aren't exactly embracing the law—in fact, most are avoiding it entirely.

We coded candidates as supporting the Affordable Care Act if they lauded the bill or its effects. We coded candidates advocating to repeal or fully replace the Affordable Care Act (also known as “Obamacare”) as opposing it. Candidates with “Complicated Positions” included those that forwarded moderated positions (i.e. the Act needs to be fixed or simply delayed), as well as those with positions outside the scope of the question (e.g. advocating for single-payer health care). Finally, if the candidate did not mention President Obama’s health reforms they were coded as “No Information.”

I think it's significantly interesting that approximately 79 percent of Republican candidates for Congress are discussing the law, as opposed to only roughly 63 percent of Democrats discussing President Obama's flagship piece of legislation. While it's fairly obvious that many Republicans are opposed to Obamacare, I think it's more telling that a sizable chunk of Democrats are not even willing to discuss their feelings about it to avoid frightening voters. With public opinion polls showing that more than half of Americans are opposed to Obamacare, can you really blame them?