By Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger
I’m running for governor because I believe that Virginia needs decisive leadership that puts Virginia first.
Wherever I go in our commonwealth, I hear from Virginians who are working longer hours — but finding it harder to get by.
From Norfolk to Norton and everywhere in between, far too many Virginians are getting squeezed. They’re feeling it in the checkout line. They’re feeling it when they pay their mortgage or pay the rent. And they’re feeling it at the pharmacy counter.
The cost of living is too high for families juggling so much, young people starting their careers, and seniors living on a fixed income. And there’s a looming fear — the threat of health care premiums rising, a child getting sick, or the need to buy expensive medication. It’s one more thing that keeps them up at night.
And yet, President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans are doing nothing to lower costs. Instead, Washington is targeting Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act, threatening to rip affordable health care coverage away from hundreds of thousands of Virginians.
These attacks don’t just hurt the Virginians who rely on this coverage — they endanger the survival of our rural hospitals, disrupt the ability of small business owners to take care of their employees, and threaten to drive up prices for all of us when uninsured families have no other option but to go to the ER.
Virginians deserve a governor who’ll push back on Congress and the president as they try to cut health care and risk further cost increases. Virginians deserve a governor who’ll stand up for them, but importantly, they also deserve a governor who’ll take action here in the commonwealth to lower costs.
That’s why I’m rolling out a straightforward agenda of what I’ll do as governor to lower health care and prescription drug costs for Virginians.
First, I’ll lower drug costs by cracking down on pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) — the middlemen of the pharmaceutical industry. Not only do PBMs inflate the cost of prescriptions, they also steer Virginians toward overpriced medications at PBM-affiliated pharmacies. As governor, I’ll ban this practice to make sure Virginians can use the pharmacy of their choice.
As governor, I’ll use the strength of the commonwealth’s purchasing power to secure lower costs on prescription drugs, getting a better deal for Virginians — and we’ll enforce the price transparency laws on the books.
I’ll also take action to make sure Virginians keep more of their hard-earned money. My administration will protect our neighbors from predatory billing and scams that enroll them in coverage they didn’t ask for. As governor, I’ll crack down on bad actors, oversee strict enforcement of our surprise billing laws, and improve hospital price transparency to make sure patients are getting the best price available.
To ensure Virginians are getting the care they deserve (and paid for), I’ll move to prevent insurance companies from dictating the medical decisions that doctors can make. Right now, when a doctor recommends a specific course of treatment, insurance companies can overrule doctors, requiring patients to try different and less expensive — for the insurance companies — treatments. While this process lowers costs for insurance companies, the real cost is borne by sick patients who suffer through trials and errors before receiving the treatment originally prescribed.
And I’ll be very clear — as governor, I’ll make sure affordable health care options are available in our rural and underserved communities. We’ll protect our community health centers, free clinics and rural hospitals. We’ll expand access to telehealth — saving taxpayers money on drives to appointments and future emergency room visits. And my administration won’t let primary care, maternal care or behavioral care take a back seat.
Virginia deserves a governor who will not just talk about the fears keeping Virginians up at night, but will actually put in the work to make Virginia more affordable. As Virginia’s next governor, I’ll do just that.