DNC topics are likely to include abortion, drug prices and medical debt

WASHINGTON – Democrats have set the stage for a convention this week that will feature plenty of boasting about some of their most popular health care accomplishments and future moon goals.

The four-day event in Chicago begins as former President Trump is stepping up his attacks on rising inflation, economic difficulties and border control policies under the Biden administration. The Republican candidate has not spent much time on health care reform in his campaign rhetoric. But Democrats see issues such as reproductive rights or lower drug prices as promising issues for voters.

Vice President Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, will speak Thursday night after a rumored appearance by Beyoncé. In the days leading up to the event, a number of high-profile Democrats are expected to speak, including vice presidential candidate Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, and a number of the “white guys” who made Harris's running mate list.

Here are the key health issues Democrats are likely to highlight.

Negotiated drug prices

The first drug prices negotiated through Medicare arrived Thursday, providing an ideal starting point for DNC speakers to talk about the Biden administration's efforts to lower drug costs – and Harris' role in that picture.

President Biden, Harris and other administration officials have already pointed out that the vice president was the deciding vote in passing the Inflation Reduction Act, a sweeping bill that allows Medicare to negotiate directly with pharmaceutical companies for lower prices on commonly used drugs.

Prices for the first 10 drugs won't go into effect until 2026, but Harris has already launched plans to “accelerate negotiations so that prices for more drugs come down faster,” according to the presidential platform announced by her campaign team on Friday. It's unclear how Harris would do that as president, given that the IRA sets the ground rules for the negotiation process and how it will be expanded in subsequent years. But her plans echo comments Biden made in his State of the Union address this year.

“I have worked my entire career to hold perpetrators accountable and lower the cost of prescription drugs,” Harris told attendees at an event in Maryland on Thursday celebrating negotiated drug prices. As California's attorney general, she joined a fraud lawsuit against GSK; the state received $3 billion as part of the settlement.

There are still questions about the savings that Medicare beneficiaries could realize from the deal. At the DNC, Harris and other administration officials are expected to defend those prices, along with other, more easily understood aspects of the IRA, such as insulin price caps and limits on copayments. The vice president promises in her platform that if elected, she will work to “cap the cost of insulin at $35 and the copayment for prescription drugs at $2,000.” allnot just seniors.” That would require cooperation with Congress – and perhaps even another deciding vote from her own vice president.

Abortion law

Harris and other Democrats have come down hard on the Trump campaign with messages on reproductive rights, and the coming week will be no exception. The issue gained momentum recently when Trump's comments at a press conference left the door open to restricting access to the abortion pill mifepristone, a stance his campaign later denied, saying Trump had misunderstood the issue.

Trump's running mate JD Vance didn't help matters when asked by CBS to elaborate on the campaign's stance on mifepristone, saying, “Obviously you want to make sure that any drug is safe, that it's prescribed properly and so on.” The comments suggested that a future Trump administration could reinstate restrictions on mail-order sales and erect other hurdles to drug prescriptions.

Those comments gave new ammunition to Harris's campaign, which has repeatedly pointed to a conservative think tank's Project 2025 plan to argue that Trump would implement a national abortion ban. Trump himself has insisted he wants to leave the issue to the states, but that message doesn't seem to resonate with voters. National polls show a majority believe that overturning Roe was wrong.

The debate over reproductive rights is also an area where Harris and her surrogates can directly advocate for their commitment. As vice president, she became the public face of the administration's efforts to strengthen abortion rights and fight against restrictions on mifepristone. She was also the first vice president to visit an abortion clinic.

Medical debt

Harris nodded to the party's progressive wing with a new platform in which she promises to wipe out billions of dollars in medical debt if elected president. That stance, however politically unfeasible, goes far beyond a Biden plan announced just months ago to exclude medical debt from credit reports – and an American Rescue Plan relief package that wiped out $7 billion in medical bills.

The country's total medical debt is estimated at over $220 billion, but it's hard to say how much the average American actually owes. Harris also revealed little during the campaign about how she plans to reduce billions in medical bills, although she did say her administration would “work with the states” on the plan.

“No one should go bankrupt just because they were unlucky enough to get sick or injured,” Harris and Walz said in a campaign statement.

The issue is likely to resonate with voters listening to the DNC speeches this week. Recent polls show that 81 percent of voters say health care debt relief is important.

Progressive groups support the new plans with caution.

The medical debt relief proposal – and efforts to speed up price negotiations – “are critical first steps,” Joseph Geevarghese, executive director of the grassroots advocacy group Our Revolution, said in a statement. “But the progressive movement will be watching closely to ensure that these measures are not only implemented, but rigorously enforced to deliver the meaningful change Americans desperately need.”

The fate of Obamacare

Democrats will also attack Trump over the Republicans' failed fight to repeal and replace the expansive and widely popular Affordable Care Act. Harris also hinted as much in her platform released Friday, warning that Trump intends to resume the fight and repeal the law, which, in addition to establishing the ACA marketplace, included protections for pre-existing condition coverage and basic insurance requirements.

Trump has stressed this year that he does not want to restart the fight to repeal the law, but wants to improve it. At a rally last week, he said he would “keep the Affordable Care Act unless we can do something much better.”

According to Gallup, public support for the Affordable Care Act has steadily increased during the fight to repeal and replace it. A majority of voters supported the law again this year, and many considered it a very important issue, according to KFF.

Biden gave a taste of the DNC's likely talking points during the event in Maryland last week. “My predecessor and his MAGA friends in Congress tried to repeal the Affordable Care Act … over 50 times,” he claimed. “We stopped them.”

Medicaid

Trump has promised not to “cut a penny” from Medicare and the other Social Security programs, reflecting their widespread popularity – and growing concerns about House Republicans' reform plans, which include raising the eligibility age.

But the former president has said little about what he plans to do with Medicaid in his second term, giving Democrats an opportunity this week to criticize his record. During his first term, the Medicaid program allowed states to implement work requirements and considered issuing block grants that would overhaul spending and limit federal funding.

Expanding Medicaid is an issue that many Democrats in swing states see as having the potential to win voters' votes. In North Carolina, where both Harris and Trump have repeatedly campaigned for their support, Governor Roy Cooper – once a candidate on Harris's vice presidential ticket – signed a bill to expand health insurance just last year. There are ten states that have not yet decided on the Democrats and where Republicans have a majority.

States' Medicaid enrollment numbers have also seen dramatic changes over the past year, as some kicked millions of enrollees off health insurance after the coronavirus emergency orders ended. The ACA market saw record numbers of enrollees during that time, but federal data this year shows the number of uninsured is rising again.

As chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, Harris' running mate Walz is well prepared to attack Republican-majority states and Trump over Medicaid.

“GOP extremists continue to threaten our progress by blocking Medicaid expansion in the states and continuing to try to undermine the health care law at the federal level,” he said in a DGA statement earlier this year, also mentioning Cooper's progress in North Carolina by name.