Democrat ad airing in Florida slams SCOTUS push as way to gut preexisting condition coverage

Image via DNC War Room

A new ad from the DNC War Room, introduced in Jacksonville and other parts of Florida to begin this week, is a six-figure bet on the message that Americans will see Donald Trump‘s Supreme Court nominee as an attack on Obamacare.

The new minute-long “Samantha” spot offers the narrative perspective of Samantha McGovern, the mother of a child with chronic lung disease.

The family contracted COVID-19 (the spot does not go into detail about the transmission), leading McGovern to rhetorically ask the President: “How can you take away the protections that ensure that people hurt by COVID aren’t denied coverage?”

“There is not a day that has gone by since this started that COVID does not terrify me. Seven million people have gotten it — and three of them are in my home,” McGovern noted.

The disease was “very scary” for the McGoverns, but that’s not the sole source of trepidation.

“What also scares me is Donald Trump trying to let insurance companies deny health coverage or charge more because of a preexisting condition.”

McGovern moves on to cast aspersions on the President’s intentions, saying Trump is “rushing through” Amy Barrett‘s nomination to the Supreme Court in order to “strip away care from millions of Americans and end preexisting condition protections.”

Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez describes health care as a “defining issue” of the 2020 election, and vows that “Floridians will hold Trump accountable for his record.”

“Families across Florida are grappling with the fear of being denied coverage in the middle of a pandemic and the fear of not being able to afford lifesaving health care,” said Perez. “Instead of keeping his promises to Floridians, Trump’s using the Supreme Court to try and strip away coverage protections for people with preexisting conditions and spike the cost of lifesaving medicine, even in the midst of the coronavirus.”

It’s unlikely that a six-figure ad buy will have much effect on the inevitability of the Barrett ascension to the seat formerly held by liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg. But the Supreme Court nominee and COVID-19 are each powerful base plays separately, and yoking them both can only help the Democrats reach those who, like Samantha, dangle on the precipice of health care uncertainty amid a shifting Supreme Court.