After fallout from Trump's comments on ending Obamacare, Florida Dems take aim at Rick Scott

A national political brouhaha over Donald Trump's recent pledge to "terminate" Obamacare is spilling into U.S. Sen. Rick Scott's re-election campaign.

Scott's likely Democratic opponent, former Congresswoman Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, has pounced on the controversy, saying she would expand the 2010 Affordable Care Act.

"Instead of wanting to hurt Florida families, I think Florida needs a senator that's going to work to protect the health of our communities, the health of our families, protect the ACA and expand coverage for those that qualify," said Mucarsel-Powell, a Miami-Dade Democrat.

The statement followed a pair of social media posts late last month in which Trump said he would "never give up" on efforts to "terminate" the health program signed into law by President Barack Obama in March 2010. The post elicited sharp blowback, and Trump issued a second missive a few days later, clarifying that he intended to replace the program with a more affordable one.

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By then, some political damage was inflicted, and Florida Democrats hoped to tag Scott, also an opponent of Obamacare, with some of the fallout.

In fact, on Friday the Democratic National Committee issued a statement calling Scott a "MAGA extremist" and one of "the biggest champions of cutting Social Security and Medicare in Congress" and said his "support for Trump is no accident — Trump proposed cuts to Medicare and Social Security programs every single year he was in office and promised to pursue cuts to these programs again if he gets another chance."

That echoed what Mucarsel-Powell said of Scott.

"He has absolutely no trust from our state on wanting to do the right thing on health care, and he actually will not be trusted to do the right thing in any issue," she said.

Scott's communications office did not respond to a request for comment on his view of Obamacare or about Trump's comments promising to repeal the federal program. His campaign communications director, Priscilla Ivasco, told Politico that the senator is a “leading voice in calling out Obamacare for failing Americans" because health care is still expensive, and that he is “looking forward to working alongside (Trump) when he wins in 2024.”

The Affordable Care Act, however, remains a sore topic among Republicans after they failed to repeal it during Trumps' presidency. Democrats have emphasized the importance of Obamacare by saying that if the GOP were successful in ending the program, millions of people would lose their health care coverage nationwide.

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Mucarsel-Powell said that while she was in Congress, she worked on negotiating lower drug costs, and that she plans to continue that work and her advocacy to protect women's reproductive health care if elected.

This message is also particularly relevant in Florida since the state tops the country with more than 3 million people enrolled in Obamacare. Yet Florida still counts about 11% of its population as uninsured as of 2022 data, which is higher than most states.

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Florida also has limited Obamacare's reach because its most recent governors, first Scott and now Ron DeSantis, have opposed expanding Medicaid eligibility in the state. In the U.S. Senate, Scott has proposed controversial legislation, including one measure that would sunset all federal programs every five years unless reauthorized by Congress.

Responding to intense criticism, including being called out by President Joe Biden in this year's State of the Union speech, Scott backpedaled and exempted Social Security, Medicare, Veterans Administration operations and national defense programs from his plan, which would still apply to Obamacare.

Mucarsel-Powell resurrects fraud case against Scott's former hospital company

Mucarsel-Powell also resurrected the role Scott's former hospital company played in what she called the "largest health care fraud case in U.S. history."

Scott cofounded Columbia Hospital Corp., later merged to be Columbia/HCA. Federal investigations into the hospital network ended with the company agreeing to pay $1.7 billion in fines in a Medicare fraud case.

Decades later, Mucarsel-Powell said Scott now is incapable of understanding the struggles of everyday Americans who can't afford health care.

"This is a man who, when he was the CEO of a health care company, committed the largest Medicare fraud in the history of the United States. With that wealth, he was able to use his personal wealth from taxpayer dollars to get into the governor's seat. When he was governor, he refused to expand Medicaid," Mucarsel-Powell said.

Stephany Matat is a politics reporter for The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY-Florida network. Reach her at smatat@pbpost.com. Support local journalism: Subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Democrats jab at Rick Scott after Trump comments on Obamacare repeal