During a town hall with Univision on Thursday, 2024 Democratic presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris responded to a question from a Department of Defense employee who said that he had to wait years for an MRI, then finally decided to go to Mexico to get treatment about how she’ll improve the medical system by saying that she believes healthcare access is a right, she wants to cap drug costs, and her Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump supports Project 2025 and repealing Obamacare.
Harris said, “I firmly and deeply believe that access to health care is a right and should be a right and not just a privilege of those who can afford or have access to it easily. It should be something that we make accessible to all people. Again, it gets back to my earlier point, it’s about the dignity of people and about the importance of doing what we can as leaders to alleviate suffering, right? When I say earlier about what I think is backwards in terms of this thinking that it’s a sign of strength to beat people down, part of the backward nature of [that kind] of thinking is to suggest that empathy…is somehow a weakness. Empathy, meaning to have some level of care and concern about the suffering of other people and then do something to lift that up. A lot of the work that I’ve done over the years, including as Vice President now, for almost four years, has been to address what we need to do to strengthen our healthcare system, whether it be what we need to strengthen the Affordable Care Act, to make sure more people have coverage, to, what we have done, which is we finally have capped the cost of insulin, for example, at $35 a month.”
She added, “And so, when we capped the cost of insulin at $35 a month, what that means is, it’s the story I hear constantly, including recently from a woman here in Las Vegas, which is, finally, her mother can afford to fill her prescription for insulin instead of trying to make it last for a longer period of time, even though that’s going to lead to her health condition worsening. The work we have done has been about capping the cost of prescription medication for seniors at $2,000. My intention as president of the United States is to now make that available, not just for seniors, but for everyone. The work that we must do is about understanding health care is a right and should not just be a privilege of those who have access to it.”
Harris further stated, “There’s a big contrast between me and Donald Trump. When he was President of the United States, he and his friends, 60 times, tried to get rid of the Affordable Care Act. … I urge everyone to look up Project 2025, which is his plan, if he is elected President again, Google it.”
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