Rachel Weiner has a smart write-up at WaPo about an ad from Heidi Heitkamp, who's running for North Dakota's Senate seat, one the Dems had been close to giving up on for this election. But not only is Heitkamp even in the polls with GOP incumbent Rick Berg, but she's not shying away from the most controversial possible platform for a Democrat: Obamacare.
With the Supreme Court set to rule on the consitutionality of Obamacare, né the Affordable Care Act, the issue could become as important to this election as it was to 2010's Democratic bloodbath, which saw even Democratic lawmakers distancing themselves as much as possible from the ACA. Things have not calmed down: Ron Gould, an Arizona congressional candidate, just had the ACA executed.
In similar style to 2010, GOP Super PACs have been running attack ads against Heitkamp, trying to scare seniors by warning that Heitkamp and Obama would cut off their Matlock health care.
Rather than running from the bill, or shooting it, former AG Heitkamp has doubled down on the idea that expansion of health care is actually a good thing that voters could want:
That's an effective ad, one that takes the denial of coverage and throws it right back in the GOP's face, and reminds everybody, through Heitkamp's personal story, that health care is a local, personal, specific issue, not one of abstract government overreach.
Heitkamp still faces an uphill battle. But the GOP needs every seat they can get, and I'll bet they're not happy about having to allot time and resources to a seat they should have won easily (the allocation of resources is not the same thing following Citizens United, but still).
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