Rick Scott ad attacks Charlie Crist on Obamacare

Gov. Rick Scott is following a prescription against Gov. Charlie Crist: Tie him to his support of the health care law and President Barack Obama.

Let’s Get to Work, a political committee supporting Scott’s re-election, unveiled a new $2 million ad buy that starts running statewide March 27.

The ad repeats snippets of Crist’s March 9 interview on CNN when he called Obamacare “great.”

“Great?” the narrator says. “News reports say 300,000 health plans canceled. Obama says patients may lose their doctors. The federal government says less work hours for American jobs,” the narrator says. “Great, Charlie? Obamacare may have been great for Charlie’s political career, but it’s not great for the rest of us.”

We fact-checked two claims from the ad. We examined the ad’s claim that the federal health care law resulted in “300,000 health plans canceled.”

Last fall, Florida Blue started sending letters to 300,000 members stating that their plans didn’t comply with Obamacare and would be canceled. However, the ad omits key information here: Members were offered new plans that complied with the law. Also, President Barack Obama later announced that people could keep their plans for another year, and most of the Florida Blue members have kept their pre-Obamacare plans for now. We rated this claim Mostly False.

We also looked at the ad’s claim that “Obamacare will drive 2.5 million Americans out of the workforce.”

The statement relates to a February Congressional Budget Office report that says workers who can now receive subsidized insurance will cut back on hours, equivalent to about 2.5 million full-time workers by 2024. The ad is misleading because the equivalent of those hours does not translate to 2.5 million actual workers, and by stating they will be driven out of the workforce suggests it’s against their will. We rated this claim Mostly False.

Spot a claim in the governor’s race in need of a fact-check? Tweet us #PolitiFactThis or email us at florida@politifact.com