CHARLOTTE, N.C. — When Gov. Brian Kemp watches today’s epic showdown between Georgia and Clemson, he’s liable to see a pointed message from his Democratic archrival.
The Fair Fight Action voting rights group launched by Stacey Abrams will air a 30-second ad Saturday that calls on Kemp to add Medicaid expansion to the agenda of a special legislative agenda he‘s calling later this year to help hospitals cope with the worsening pandemic.
Kemp already plans to call the General Assembly back to the Capitol around November to redraw legislative maps following the 2020 Census and consider new anti-crime crackdowns. As governor, Kemp can add other items to the agenda.
The first-term Republican will surely reject the idea. He’s long opposed expanding Medicaid as too expensive in the long run, and he’s pursued a more narrowly tailored program to add more Georgians to the Medicaid rolls that’s been put on hold by the Biden administration.
Polls, including those by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, show that a broad majority of Georgians support expanding under the Affordable Care Act to expand Medicaid to roughly 500,000 Georgians.
Georgia is one of about a dozen states, all led by Republicans, that have refused to expand Medicaid even as the Democratic-controlled Congress tries to sweeten the pot by offering federally funded incentives to ease the costs.
Abrams, who is expected to mount a rematch against Kemp in 2022, made Medicaid expansion a central issue in her 2018 campaign against Kemp, calling it her top priority if elected. The governor has touted his counterproposal as the more fiscally responsible alternative.
The ad will air in Atlanta, in Athens and across the state and, given the attention toward tonight’s game featuring two top-five teams, will be seen by a large number of Georgia voters.
Watch the ad here:
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