BPC's Hoagland and Hayes on Biden Executive Order to Expand Health Care

Washington, DC – The Bipartisan Policy Center issued the following statement by G. William Hoagland, BPC senior vice president, and Katherine Hayes, BPC health policy director, regarding President Joe Biden’s executive order to establish a special open enrollment period for the Affordable Care Act’s insurance marketplace.

“President Biden’s executive order to reopen enrollment on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges is a critical step to addressing the loss of employer-sponsored health insurance during the COVID-related recession and to helping uninsured Americans. An estimated 3.6 million people lost employer-sponsored coverage between March and October of 2020. This action directs the Department of Health and Human Services to open HealthCare.gov for a special enrollment period from February 15 to May 15 of 2021. The executive order also directed agencies to conduct an examination of federal policies that limit access to private insurance Medicaid. We applaud that action.

“In the coming weeks, BPC hopes that Congress will be able to find bipartisan, near-term solutions to address COVID-19. In the coming months, we expect a Supreme Court decision on California v. Texas that will decide the future of the ACA. A decision to strike down the law would jeopardize coverage for millions of Americans at the worst possible time.

“We encourage Congress to work toward broader, bipartisan agreements to address rising health care costs and make health insurance more affordable. In February of 2020, BPC’s health care leaders came together to address these issues and proposed a bipartisan path forward in the report A Bipartisan Rx for America’s Health Care. We hope these recommendations will move the debate forward and end the partisan divide over health care.”