Laura Packard has been in a fight for her life, undergoing chemotherapy for stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma. In September, she made waves in her fight to bring Republicans to account for their attacks on the Affordable Care Act when she posted a video about white supremacist in chief Donald Trump blocking her on Twitter. Since then, Ms. Packard continues to fight for both her life and the lives of millions of other Americans. It’s the fighting for more people than just one’s self that excludes Ms. Packard from the Republican Party. A Nevada resident, Packard had planned on asking Sen. Dean Heller his reasoning for voting to throw people off of their health care plans and disable the ACA’s individual mandate. This video was released a few days ago.
Ms. Packard made good on her word and stood up to ask Sen. Heller why he was attacking the health care of millions. Sen. Heller, probably best known for looking like someone who smells like too much aftershave lotion, made sure there was little to no opposition when he gave his bogus answer.
Packard is escorted out after she sits down. She isn’t yelling, she isn’t chanting. She asked a question. Sen. Heller is a cowardly mouse of a man, not even willing to face her as he gives the great bullshit statement that doing away with the “individual mandate” allows “90,000 Nevadans” to not have to pay the “tax.” For this he gets a round of applause from a bunch of people who I can only call “fucking idiots.” As FamilyUSA explains, there are a few more people adversely affected than these “90,000” people in Nevada.
Approximately 1.2 million Nevadans with pre-existing conditions like asthma, diabetes, and cancer could once again be denied affordable, comprehensive coverage that actually covers their health care needs.
Women in Nevada will once again be charged more for health coverage just for being a woman.
- Prior to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), women in Nevada were charged as much as 45 percent more than men for the same coverage.
Nevadans will once again face a world where insurance plans routinely cap the most they will pay for someone’s health care in a year and in their lifetime, effectively cutting off coverage for the sickest individuals when they most need it.
- Roughly 937,000 Nevadans (including 269,000 children) saw lifetime limits on coverage disappear thanks to the ACA’s ban on these practices.
That’s 10 times more constituents whose actual livelihoods are put into grave danger because of Sen. Heller’s lies. For this, Heller earns the piece of shit of the day award. He can put it next to his other piece of shit awards for his super pro-gun advocacy that has helped stymie other aspects of public health, as well as his conman’s craven attempts to take credit for doing zilch.