Two Missouri healthcare groups called on US Senate Candidate Josh Hawley to drop his lawsuit striking down parts of the Affordable Care Act in order to protect people with pre-existing conditions.
On Monday afternoon, members from Protect Our Care Missouri and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Missouri drove in a flatbed truck covered in signage to a Columbia gym. They said it will help bring awareness to the lawsuit and get more people asking questions.
In February, Hawley filed a lawsuit that would seek to repeal parts of the Affordable Care Act.
Sean Whiting is the Manager of Public Policy and Organizing for Planned Parenthood Advocates of Missouri. He said Hawley’s actions do not line up with what he claims to support.
“He really can’t have it both ways,” Whiting said. “He can’t both claim to be for things in the ACA that he claims to stand for, and against things his actions show he is suing to remove.”
Tom Bastian is the spokesperson for Protect Our Care Missouri. He said if Hawley really wants to protect people with pre-existing conditions, then there is a simple solution.
“Drop the lawsuit,” Bastian said.
He said the truck he drove into the parking lot speaks for itself, with the help of all the signage, but Bastian said the only thing missing from the flatbed is Hawley.
“We hope the Attorney General will start providing answers to his motivations and to why he wants to remove these protections from people,” Bastian said.
Research by the Missouri Hospital Association published in June 2017 suggest 30 percent of non-elderly people in Missouri have a deniable pre-existing condition. Both Bastian and Whiting said if Hawley’s lawsuit is successful, those people could be denied coverage.
In a statement from Hawley's campaign website, the Attorney General writes: "It's unconstitutional for the government to force us to buy something we don't want. Senator McCaskill would have you believe that the only way to cover pre-existing conditions is to keep all the failures of Obamacare. That's simply not true. I'm committed to covering those with pre-existing conditions, and we don't have to break the Consititution to do it."
Hawley is challenging US Senator Claire McCaskill, a Democrat, for the US Senate seat.
This story was updated to include a statement from Attorney General Josh Hawley's campaign.