Jason Lewis and Angie Craig spar over health care and taxes in first debate

Oct. 20--Republican U.S. Rep. Jason Lewis and Democratic challenger Angie Craig traded verbal jabs over health care and taxes Friday night in their first debate of the campaign.

Appearing on Twin Cities Public Television's "Almanac" show, Lewis and Craig had a fiery exchange over the best ways to provide health care coverage for all while holding down costs.

Craig, a former medical device company executive, said the bill the Republican-controlled Congress passed last year would have "knocked millions of Americans off their health care."

The new law would have allowed insurance companies to deny coverage to people with pre-existing health conditions, she said, and she asserted that Lewis is "not willing to stand up to the president" when the Trump administration went to court to allow states to permit insurers to refuse to cover consumers with chronic health problems.

You're wrong, Lewis responded. The bill Congress passed "expressly protected those with pre-existing conditions," he said. That law bars insurance companies from denying coverage to people "if you are up to date on your premiums." But they could refuse to cover people who let their health coverage lapse.

Congress repealed the "individual mandate" that required all adults to buy health insurance, and critics warned that would drive up costs for people who need medical care because the young and healthy would drop their coverage.

But Lewis said the individual mandate provisions in the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, caused skyrocketing insurance premiums.

"We want to set the rates lower so young and healthy people get back into the pool to subsidize the old, the sick and the infirm," he said.

Asked about Medicare, the federal insurance program for seniors, Craig said she does not support Sen. Bernie Sanders' government-run "Medicare for all" proposal, but she backs a "Medicare buy-in" that would let younger adults purchase insurance through the government program.

Lewis accused her of flip-flopping on the issue. He said she once advocated a government-controlled "single payer" health insurance system but now says she's against it. As for the "buy-in" proposal she now favors, he said it "will end Medicare as we know it for seniors."

Not true, Craig fired back. "Having healthier people in Medicare would strengthen it," she said.

Their contest is a rematch of the 2016 election in the south suburban 2nd Congressional District. Lewis upset Craig by less than 2 percentage points in that race, and political odds makers rate this year's election as a tossup.

The two candidates also fired broadsides at each over tax cuts. Lewis touted the tax reductions he voted for and Congress passed last year, saying they are saving taxpayers in the 2nd District an average of $3,000 this year and sparking job growth and a booming economy. "It's a great success," he said.

Craig said the law provides huge tax breaks for the rich and so little for average taxpayers that most people haven't noticed them. She said she favors lowering taxes "for the middle class and small businesses."

The candidates will face off again Sunday afternoon in a debate on KSTP TV.

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