Former Vice President Joe Biden sought to gin up support for his presidential campaign’s health care policy during Wednesday night’s Democratic presidential primary debates.
Biden’s campaign sent a press release to supporters advertising the gift of a sticker reading “Obamacare: It’s a BFD” after his fellow 2020 contenders attacked his health care policy that seeks to “protect and build on Obamacare.”
{mosads}The sticker’s message refers to an expletive Biden was recorded uttering to then-President Obama at a 2010 signing ceremony for the Affordable Care Act: “This is a big f—ing deal.”
Biden, widely viewed as the front-runner for the Democratic nomination according to most polls, weathered attacks from several fellow 2020 contenders Wednesday night including Sens. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.
Biden attacked Harris for her “Medicare for All” plan, warning of tax increases and the elimination of employer-based private insurance, continuing a tussle between two front-runners that began in the first debate.
“Your plan does not cover everyone in America,” Harris told Biden Wednesday night, adding: “our plan will bring health care to all Americans under a Medicare for All system”
The central debate is between Harris’s plan of Medicare for All versus Biden’s more moderate plan to give people the option of a government-run plan but also allow private insurance to remain.