Woman Hailed by President as Obamacare Success Story Now Can't Afford Obamacare
Daniel Halper
CNN reports that a woman the president hailed as an Obamacare success story just realized she won't be able to afford Obamacare because it's too expensive:
"Jessica Sanford was cited by the president as an Obamacare success story at a health care event he had here at the White House in the Rose Garden on October 21," says a reporter for CNN from the White House. "That of course being just last month. The 48-year-old single mom from Washington state purchased what she considered to be affordable health care, life-changing event, she said, on the Washington state health exchange. She decided she was so excited about this news, she wanted to write an e-mail to the president to say that this had really changed her life and that she was thankful for the Afforable Care Act. The president included her e-mail in his remarks to people on hand for the event. Here's a bit of what the president had to say."
The CNN report quotes President Obama as saying, "I recently received a letter from a woman named Jessica Sanford in Washington state. And here's what she wrote, I am a single mom, no child support, self-employed. and I haven't had insurance for 15 years because it's too expensive. I was crying the other day when I signed up, so much stress lifted."
"But days, just really three days after she was mentioned by the president, Jessica Sanford started having problems, she was receiving letters from the Washington state health exchange," reports CNN. "The first letter telling her that tax credit was reduced, therefore, increasing the cost of her health care plan and the, take a look at this, then she received a letter just last week telling her that her tax credit had been taken away all together. Show you another document here, showing what the tax credit worked out to be... zero dollars according to this document that was provided to us by Jessica Sanford. She describes all of this as a roller coaster ride. Now she says she can't afford insurance in Washington state because of the new developments."
Sanford tells CNN that she's embarrassed. "It was a huge disappointment, especially since I had, you know, my story had been shared by the president. I felt like, you know, I just felt really embarrassed that, you know, he quoted my story and then come to find that the Washington health plan finder, the website here in our state, had grossly miscalculated or they're having a problem figuring their tax credits. and so at least for right now, I don't -- I'm not going to be getting insurance," she says.
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