The first wave of Obamacare cancellations has hit a group of Americans who are well-positioned to swing several critical Senate elections next November.
“This voting bloc could have a decisive impact in close races in 2014,” according to a Nov. 11 memo from Resurgent Republic, a survey firm that tracks public opinion on GOP-related priorities.
“Four of the nine most competitive states that Senate Democrats are defending have self insured populations at or above the national average” of 5 percent, said the report.
Nine percent of Montana’s population is self-insured. Eight percent of South Dakota’s residents, 6 percent of Iowa’s and 5 percent of Michigan’s residents are also self-insured.
Four percent of the residents in North Carolina, Arkansas and Louisiana are self-insured, says the report.
The 15 Democratic senators facing election in 2014 held a two-hour “tense” meeting with President Barack Obama last week.
The results from previous elections suggest that self-insured people were more likely to turn out in 2014.
A survey prior to the 2012 election suggested that 21 percent of voters were self-insured. In 2009, self-insured voters were 18 percent of registered voters, said the Resurgent Republican survey.
Obamacare is also spiking prices in several states with elections in 2014.
“The self-insured in six of the nine most competitive Democrat-held Senate seats up in 2014 face an average premium hike greater than 50 percent, not to mention higher annual deductibles and steeper premiums for younger, healthier individuals,” said the survey.
In the 2012 campaign, a slight majority of these voters tended to support Obama. Roughy one-third identify as Democrats, one as Republicans, and a third classify themselves as independents.
The voters are “representative of middle class voters Republicans need to reach. If Republicans can effectively speak to the anxiety caused by Obamacare, they’ll find an attentive audience, especially in battleground 2014 states,” the survey concluded.