Chicago Sun-Times: Gov hopeful Pritzker spends $1 million on Obamacare enrollment ads

By Lynn Sweet

Obamacare health insurance enrollment kicks off on Wednesday, and in the wake of President Donald Trump draining almost all funding to promote sign-ups, two Democrats and a Republican are stepping up to fill that void.

Democratic governor candidate JB Pritzker is paying about $1 million to run radio and digital ads to run all across Illinois.

Pritzker’s ads start on Wednesday and will run through the enrollment period, which ends Dec. 15. The site to enroll is www.healthcare.gov.

Pritzker, locked in a Democratic primary, is making the ad buy as Democrats at the local and national levels are trying to fill in the gaps caused by Trump’s attempts to dismantle former President Barack Obama’s signature Affordable Health Care Act. […]

Billionaire Pritzker is self-funding his campaign and spokeswoman Galia Slayen said the $1 million for the ads will come out of Pritzker’s campaign fund. Slayen said it is likely that Pritzker is the only candidate paying for ads to promote Obamacare enrollment. […]

In one spot, Pritzker says, “There are hundreds of thousands of Illinoisans currently benefiting from Obamacare, but one of Donald Trump’s strategies to kill the program is to make it harder to sign up. This year, he’s cut the period to enroll in Obamacare by half and cut advertising to tell people about it by 90 percent. We can’t let Donald Trump win.

“If you’re interested in signing up, the enrollment period is from November 1 to December 15. For more information, go to http://www.healthcare.gov. That’s www.healthcare.gov. Again, this is JB Pritzker. The truth is, there’s a lot that can be done in Illinois to fight against what’s going on in Washington, but Bruce Rauner’s doing nothing. As your governor, I’ll stand up to Donald Trump and always fight for Illinois.”

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