Joe Biden is opening up a Special Enrollment Period for the ACA marketplaces. Here's a🧵on why this a BFD! 1/

2/ Trump took many steps to sabotage the ACA and its marketplaces. He severely restricted the Open Enrollment period to just 6 weeks and then cut the outreach and advertising budget by 90%. Awareness of dates, deadlines, and options is already low, so this was a big problem.

3/ Last Spring, everyone - including the insurance companies - was urging Trump to open a Special Enrollment Period because otherwise, uninsured people who simply wanted insurance in the middle of the pandemic or people who didn't have employer coverage before couldn't sign up.

4/ But Trump refused, despite reports that HHS/CMS officials favored a SEP. So if you were say a bartender and didn't have coverage through work before the pandemic and lost your job because of it, you wouldn't be able to sign up until November of 2021.

5/ Biden is now taking this important step that could get MILLIONS of people covered. Because Trump didn't do advertising or much outreach, there is $1 BILLION that is sitting unused in accounts that could be put to work in order to get people covered.