INDIANAPOLIS – Republican efforts to repeatedly sabotage the nation’s health care system and cause higher health care premiums have come home to roost as the party begins to confront the fact that voters will blame them for their inflated bills in November.

Axios reported last week that Senate Republicans and their candidates have little choice other than “leaning in” on the campaign trail to their sabotage of the health care markets. With voters increasingly giving Republicans responsibility for the failing health care system, the party’s candidates are realizing they must try to spit-shine their sabotage efforts – even though those actions are leading to double-digit premium hikes set to be finalized just weeks before election day.

Even “some Republican aides and strategists acknowledge this strategy could backfire,” the report goes on to say, “by either reminding voters of the unpopular [health care] repeal effort or by linking vulnerable members to premium hikes.”

The GOP sabotage has caused chaos in the Indiana insurance markets. A recent report by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office predicted premiums will rise by as much as 34% next year, primarily thanks to changes in the McConnell tax plan that will likely cause as many as 13 million Americans to go without health care within the decade. Another analysis reported in the Washington Post stated that rates in Indiana would likely rise by as much as 50% within the next three years for similar reasons.

“Republicans like Congressmen Messer and Rokita and Rep. Braun are facing the consequences for thinking they could wreak havoc on the health care marketplaces for their own political benefit,” said Michael Feldman, spokesman for the Indiana Democratic Party. “After seeing that outrageous double-digit premiums are set to hit Hoosiers, it seems the only reason Republican candidates will run on their sabotage is because they can’t run from it.”

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