Editor:

Leslie Cockburn will work to protect health care for the 5th District.

I’m going to vote for Democrat Leslie Cockburn to represent the 5th District in Congress on Nov. 6. This is one reason.

In 2019, a family of four in the 5th District will pay $5,410 more in health care premiums because of the GOP’s sabotage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), based on the Urban Institute’s projections. In August, Vice President Mike Pence promised reporters in Wisconsin that Republicans would try again to repeal the ACA completely if midterm elections go well for the GOP. We can’t afford further gutting of the ACA.

Denver Riggleman, the Republican running against Leslie Cockburn, wants to repeal the ACA. On DenverforCongress.org, he stated that government should get out of health care, and Virginians should just pay their own medical bills with pretax health savings accounts! When my son injured his hand, he owed thousands to the hospital and rehab center—even with insurance. Can Riggleman be that out of touch with incomes and health care costs in Virginia? Apparently so. What is even scarier is that he has allied himself with the Freedom Caucus, which has been trying to remove all protections for pre-existing conditions ever since the ACA became law. We all have pre-existing conditions.

Leslie Cockburn, on the other hand, has spent 35 years as an investigative journalist exposing wrongs in Washington, Wall Street, and around the world. She has pledged to champion those things important to the 5th District: protecting the ACA, Medicare, Social Security and our environment. Riggleman has pledged to remove the laws that protect us.

Of course, I will vote for Leslie Cockburn. I hope you do, too.

Robin Smith

Farmville