WASHINGTON – President Obama is crisscrossing the country giving his ShamWow pitch to salvage his landmark health care law, including a visit to deeply red Texas. But abysmal new data showing only 5 people in the D.C. area have signed up for ObamaCare, suggests the president should have perhaps started right where he was.
The enrollment data, which was requested by Republican lawmakers, was provided by the four health insurance companies participating in the D.C. exchange and released Friday by Republicans Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Orrin Hatch of Utah.
“A lot of Americans are getting cancellation notices from their current health care plan but they haven’t been able to enroll in a new plan,” Sen. Grassley said in a written statement. “The limbo and uncertainty are stressful for them, as they’ve been describing in emails to my office. The chaos imposed on so many people is reason to at least delay the individual mandate, if not outright appeal it.”
Grassley and Hatch had contacted CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield, Kaiser Permanente, UnitedHealthcare and Aetna in response to the Obama administration’s clear effort to keep the numbers secret. CareFirst reported two enrollees from Oct. 1 through Oct. 30. Kaiser Permanente reported three enrollees from Oct. 1 through Oct. 31. Neither UnitedHealthcare or Aetna had any enrollment data as of Nov. 4 and Oct. 24 respectively.
“With numbers like these, it’s no wonder the Obama administration hasn’t wanted to release how many people have signed up for ObamaCare,” Sen. Hatch said. “With data from D.C.’s four participating health plans in, there’s been a whopping five people enrolled in the city’s exchange. That’s right – five. Whether it’s significant problems with the website, people being forced off the coverage they had or skyrocketing costs, these numbers are even more proof of what a disaster ObamaCare is and why it should be delayed.”
Health and Human Service Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told both Senators this week that they now should expect to see enrollment figures that were “very low.” But numbers this low have even managed to astonish the most ardent supporters of limited government, because it shows a level of inefficiency and incompetence that even exceeds the expectations of those who most loudly argue “no, government can’t.”
