Sen. Cotton: Not Up to Supreme Court to Fix Healthcare Policy

Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats focused on the Affordable Care Act and preexisting conditions during the first day of Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett's confirmation hearings because they cover up the "continued failures" of the nation's healthcare law, Sen. Tom Cotton said Tuesday. 

"They want to cover up the continued failures of Obamacare and higher premiums or what the individual mandate did to tax families who couldn't afford Obamacare," the Arkansas Republican said on Fox News' "Fox and Friends." "That's why I worked to have it repealed."

Cotton added that Democrats are also glossing over the "fact that we also have a plan to cover preexisting conditions."

"We don't want Obamacare to continue to drive up rates," said Cotton, "but those are questions for us in the Congress and the president. That's not what the Supreme Court does, and I would suggest that Judge Barrett simply tell the senators today that you're responsible for healthcare policy, not the Supreme Court."

Meanwhile, Democrat presidential nominee Joe Biden is now accusing President Donald Trump and Senate Republicans of stacking the Supreme Court by pushing through Barrett's nomination, but Cotton said that "court packing has had a very clear meaning to ordinary citizens and experts alike for 83 years."

The term really means attempts to add justices because one party does not like the current number or judicial philosophy, said Cotton. With Democrats calling to add justices, he continued, that would provide a "super-legislature" that would work with them to fill their agenda items. 

"It's been tried once in our history, and not even [President] Franklin Delano Roosevelt at the peak of his powers could achieve such a radical reform that would fundamentally undermine the Supreme Court and our independent judiciary," said Cotton. "It's time for Joe Biden to give a clear answer."

With the Supreme Court, Democrats want "outcome-oriented justices" that always rule in the liberal direction, he said, but Barrett has shown she rules according to law. 

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