Election day is finally here, and it brings with it a strong chance that the United States will have elected a Republican Congress by day’s end. As of this morning, the Washington Post Election Lab was forecasting a 99 percent chance of Republican victory in the House and a 98 percent chance of the same in the Senate.
Important races, where there could be potential surprises, include some usual suspects: Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire and North Carolina. Among states Republicans seemed poised to win from Democratic incumbents are Montana, West Virginia, South Dakota, Arkansas, Alaska and Louisiana.
But what does this strong Republican position mean for healthcare?
1. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act may well have already been as popular as it will ever be. Despite Democratic hopes to the contrary, the PPACA remains unpopular. It’s not a broad-based entitlement program like Medicare, and it caters to a specific population segment, which means the majority of PPACA supporters may already be on the bandwagon.
2. Republican control of Congress won’t mean a repeal of the PPACA. It probably won’t even mean an attempted repeal of the PPACA. While Republicans ran on the repeal platform for midterm seats, it has recently fallen out of favor on the Hill. Rather, the discussion about the healthcare law will likely shift from one where Congress would either expand the law or leave it as-is to one where some provisions — taxes and mandates — will be on the chopping block. Republicans have plenty of budgetary tools at their discretion in this regard.
3. The public isn’t passionate about the PPACA. While the law was one of the deciding issues in the 2010 midterms, the American public now places the economy far above the PPACA in terms of vote-impacting issues. While it’s unpopular, it’s between fourth and sixth on the list of top concerns for American, depending on the polling source.
4. What the Republican party does when it controls Congress is a far stronger predictor of the future of healthcare and the PPACA than anything else. Careful treatment of healthcare issues could help a Republican candidate win the presidency in 2016. Having aligned executive and legislative branches could pave the way for significant overhauls to the PPACA, or additional healthcare legislation proposed and passed in a way that would be much harder to achieve with a Democratic president.
With that said, be sure to take time during your day to cast your vote. Find your polling place here.