GOP candidates turn up the volume on lower health insurance costs

Republicans are testing a new midterm message: They’re populists fighting against health insurance companies while working to lower premium costs.

Rep. Thomas Kean Jr. is a New Jersey Republican seeking reelection in a competitive district this November.

In an ad produced in collaboration with the National Republican Congressional Committee, Mr. Kean says he will take on insurance companies.

"I meet too many families who pay too much, who get denied care, who suffer because of big insurance companies,” Mr. Kean says. “I had enough. I took on the insurance companies to get costs down.”

The ad cites his past support for legislation to require mental health coverage and to extend expiring premium tax credits.

The offensive on insurers comes as some Republicans say voters want the party to aggressively reform health insurance.

A March survey of 2,000 likely voters conducted by McLaughlin & Associates, a firm that has worked for President Trump’s campaigns, found support for Republicans being tough on the industry.

The poll, conducted for Americans for Health Excellence and presented to the NRCC in August, found 65% of voters said they were “more likely” to vote for “a Republican candidate who supports enforcing stricter penalties against insurance companies to save hundreds of billions of dollars lost to waste, abuse, and fraud.” 

Data on how voters respond to candidates adopting these policies could show why Republicans are adopting the tough-on-insurance strategy. That data has not been reported.

The polling also found high support for other policies meant to drive down costs. The Trump administration has adopted such policies, especially with its “most favored nation” pricing agreements with drug companies that have dramatically lowered costs for medicine.

Brad Wenstrup, a Republican former congressman from Ohio who leads AFHE, told The Washington Times in a statement, “It's clear that American patients, as voters, want action to make healthcare affordable.”

He added, “Their number one healthcare concern is the cost of health insurance, and they also want relief they can feel at the pharmacy counter and with providers. Republicans have the solutions that Americans are looking for, and they’ll earn real support at the ballot box if they own the healthcare debate.”

Democrats have usually held the advantage on healthcare issues in public opinion, and the issue will also factor into their November message.

The campaign of Mr. Kean’s Democratic opponent, Rebecca Bennett, fired back at his healthcare messaging in a statement to The Times.

“Look at what Tom Kean Jr. does, not what he says,” said Carly Jones, a Bennett campaign spokeswoman, adding that he supported “the One Big Beautiful Bill, which has spiked healthcare costs … while he holds hundreds of thousands of dollars in healthcare stocks and takes corporate PAC money.”

Mr. Kean has made the insurance issue central to the high-stakes race, attacking Ms. Bennett for her work with healthcare companies.

In one Kean campaign ad, a constituent identified as Christina criticizes insurance companies for denying claims despite her daughter needing “24/7 care” for a health condition.

“When Rebecca Bennett was working with healthcare companies that were denying care to patients and overbilling taxpayers, I have a real problem with that," she says. “We need to hold Rebecca Bennett accountable, not elect her to Congress.”

The strategy extends beyond New Jersey.

In Michigan’s 7th Congressional District — one of the most competitive battlegrounds in the country — Republican Rep. Tom Barrett has unveiled an ad boasting of returning insurance companies’ donations.

“They get richer while we get sicker,” Mr. Barrett says in the ad. “I don’t take a dime from health insurance companies. I sent their money back and told them to lower premiums instead. Then I wrote the Care Over Profits Act to force them to spend more of your money on your care.”

Jason Cabel Roe, a consultant for Mr. Barrett’s campaign, told The Times that the congressman has “been on the receiving end of a lot of attacks” on healthcare issues and “wanted to lean on it and lay some markers down” with his policies.

Similarly, in New Hampshire’s Senate race, the Senate Leadership Fund, a PAC allied with Senate Majority Leader John Thune, South Dakota Republican, is running an ad accusing Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas of favoring insurance companies.

“The biggest health insurance companies banked $50 billion of profits last year. They’re denying health claims and jacking up premiums,” says the ad’s narrator. “What did Chris Pappas do? Nothing. Pappas voted to line the pockets of health insurers.”

The ad references Mr. Pappas’ vote for a bill to extend COVID-era premium tax credit levels, which function as subsidies to insurance companies.

The results in November will determine just how effective the GOP’s health insurance strategy is and whether it can compete with Democrats’ promises of Medicare for all and subsidies to cover premium costs. 

Asked about the rationale behind Mr. Kean's insurance-themed ads, NRCC spokeswoman Maureen O'Toole reiterated their thesis, calling Mr. Kean "a champion for New Jersey families’ access to healthcare."

Distributed by Newsbank, inc.