Steve Beshear

Public health has always been the foundation of the United States’ success since its founding. It has extended life expectancy. It’s improved community health. It’s made everyday life much better for millions of people.

That requires communication. That requires sitting down in good faith and talking through things and recognizing the differences, and then coming to some kind of agreement that will get us to where we all want to go.

Governor, you cannot afford not to do this because it is going to be so good for your State.

Some people will die because they do not have the coverage that they need.

What they need is a strong statement from this Congress that says, 'Look. We are committed to every American to give coverage to them.'

I think what you end up with is backing off of a commitment this country has made to make sure that everybody has affordable healthcare.

It is getting all of our people healthy because with healthy people not only is their quality of life better, but our workforce will be more productive.

Opioid abuse in this country is one of the biggest issues that we have got to face and we have got to face it quickly.

You cannot incarcerate yourself out of an opioid emergency. You have to treat your way out of it.

The essential benefit of substance abuse treatment in the Affordable Care Act has been monumental in helping to do that.

It looks like Congress is pulling the Pontius Pilate routine and washing their hands of all of our folks and then blaming it on me.

It is a no-brainer both from the health of your people and from the budget that you have got to operate.

If you block grant Medicaid, in essence, you are going to send me less money than it takes to run the program.

People are going to lose their care. Lots of people are going to lose their care.

the path forward is not a 'replacement' plan that covers fewer people and provides less robust benefits.

the results were compelling. The study concluded that expanding Medicaid would inject $15.6 billion into Kentucky's economy over 8 years

This is not a partisan issue. This is a people issue. And it is time to put people over politics.

You must not rush to repeal or put in place a plan that reduces either the number of people who are covered or the benefits they can access because this tool is working.

As a former Governor, I urge all Governors to reject any proposal that will leave their States with less Federal funding, reduced coverage, and less robust benefit package--and this includes a rush to repeal the ACA without a viable plan…

As Governor of Kentucky, I embraced the Affordable Care Act for one simple reason: Kentucky's collective health had long been terrible, and what we'd been doing for generations wasn't working.

The ACA gave us an opportunity to change that using a State-based, market-driven approach, and I seized the chance.

it is vitally important that we build on that success rather than simply repeal the ACA to make a political statement

The ACA has saved lives, led millions to gain coverage, and benefited every American.

Repeal without a broad, comprehensive replacement will cause millions to lose their insurance, and many will die.