Buttigieg targets Warren, Sanders on health care in new ad ahead of debate

WESTERVILLE, Ohio — Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg took aim at fellow 2020 contenders Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on health care in a new ad on Tuesday ahead of the fourth Democratic debate. 

The digital ad, titled “Makes More Sense,” features a number of television anchors and analysts talking about the South Bend, Ind., mayor’s plan, and comparing it to Sanders’s and Warren’s “Medicare for All” proposal. 

{mosads}“Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren believe that we have to force ourselves into Medicare for All, where private insurance is abolished,” Joe Lockhart, a CNN political analyst and former press secretary to President Clinton, said in a video clip that was included in the ad. 

“Mayor Pete said, ‘Medicare for all who want it.’ That’s a much better formulation,” CNN political commentator Van Jones said in another clip in the ad. 

The digital ad is set to air in Iowa on a number of platforms, according to Buttigieg’s campaign. 

The ad’s release comes hours before the debate in Westerville, Ohio, Tuesday evening, signaling that Buttigieg could hit Sanders and Warren over their proposed Medicare for All plans. 

Warren’s and Sanders’s plans would replace private health insurance with a single program run by the government. 

Buttigieg has criticized the progressive senators’ positions on health care in the past, questioning whether their plans would raise taxes on the middle class. 

The mayor has proposed automatically enrolling individuals without health insurance, while also allowing those who have insurance through their employer to keep their plans or join the new government plan. 

— This report was updated at 7:08 a.m.