Schmid Campaign Stands By Mailers Highlighting Chris Smith’s Decades-Long Record of Attacking Our Healthcare

During Monday’s Asbury Park Press debate for the CD-4 candidates, Rep. Chris Smith refused to answer questions about his record on healthcare and how he would lead us out of this global pandemic and protect our health as the senior Republican on the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Global Public Health, instead he used his time to attack our campaign’s early October mailer citations.

The Stephanie Schmid congressional campaign mailer from early October did have an error in a citation that has since been corrected, but we unequivocally stand behind the substance of the mailer detailing Smith’s terrible record on healthcare which has spanned decades. One need look no further than earlier this year, in the midst of a global pandemic, when Smith voted against H.R.1425, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Enhancement Act, which would expand and protect key elements of the Affordable Care Act for proof of his hostility to the Affordable Care Act. Or we could go back to January 2011 when he stood on the floor of the House of Representatives and said: Mr. Speaker, I respectfully ask that my colleagues listen to the American people and vote for H.R. 2, legislation to repeal Obamacare.” Or how about his vote against H.R. 3 in 2019 which would have enabled the federal government to negotiate directly with the drug companies through Medicare, created strong new tools to force drug companies to the table to agree to real price reductions, and made the lower drug prices negotiated by Medicare available to Americans with private insurance, not just Medicare beneficiaries.

“This election should not be about mailers or political attacks, but instead should be focused on the people of New Jersey and across our country who are rationing their insulin because of skyrocketing prescription drug prices, the thousands of Americans who have lost their jobs and their health insurance as a result of the pandemic, and how our representatives in Washington should be working to ensure that every American has access to affordable healthcare as a fundamental human right,” Schmid said. “For the last 39 years, under Chris Smith’s watch, our healthcare system has imploded. Out of pocket costs have drastically increased, people are being forced to choose between their medications or putting food on the table, and Smith has done absolutely nothing to improve our healthcare system. As the next Congresswoman in NJ-04, I will work tirelessly to make sure that every American has healthcare coverage, expand healthcare services to include mental health, substance abuse, and reproductive healthcare, and lower the cost of prescription drugs. Send me to Washington, and I will fight for healthcare for all of us.”

Chris Smith is clearly detrimental to the health and well-being of New Jersey families and Americans across the United States. And if we want to discuss campaign mailers, how about Smith’s recent mailer painting himself as a champion of women, with zero citations — a claim which could not be further from the truth.

If Chris Smith wants to whine about campaign mailers and make false statements, we can arrange another public debate where the two candidates can discuss every single vote he’s taken as a 39-year career politician, including each of the numerous votes where he voted against our healthcare and against our interests. Given Stephanie’s decisive victory in the first debate, his months-long attempt to avoid a public forum in the first place, and his decades-long record of failure, we doubt he will agree.