Why are Kansas and Missouri trying to kill Obamacare during the COVID-19 pandemic?

The attorneys general in Missouri and Kansas are continuing their pointless campaign to invalidate the entire Affordable Care Act — in the middle of a pandemic that has claimed more than 1,200 lives in the two states.

Eric Schmitt of Missouri and Derek Schmidt of Kansas both signed a Supreme Court brief insisting the entire act, also known as Obamacare, must fall. That includes protections for patients with pre-existing conditions, leaving young adults on parents’ policies, even nutritional information at some restaurants.

Because Congress set the tax penalty for not having insurance at $0, the brief says the entire ACA must collapse. Kansas and Missouri are two of 18 states arguing against the law.

It isn’t clear why. Are residents in either state clamoring for an end to the Affordable Care Act in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic? Save for a few on the very fringe, the answer is no. Most Kansans and Missourians have come to accept the ACA and rely on the benefits it provides.

In fact, in less than six weeks, Missouri voters will decide whether the state should expand the ACA’s benefits by offering Medicaid to an additional 300,000 residents. We’re confident they’ll do so because it’s the right thing to do.

If Schmitt’s view prevails, on the other hand, Medicaid expansion will be in jeopardy. So will existing insurance for more than 185,000 Missourians who now use ACA tax credits to buy coverage on an exchange. Almost 75,000 low-income Kansans would be similarly affected.

Ending the Affordable Care Act now, as the coronavirus continues to ravage both states, is beyond senseless.

But it’s even worse than that. The ACA now says insurance companies must cover patients with pre-existing conditions such as high blood pressure or heart disease. That protection will go away if the law dies.

There is growing evidence that patients recovering from COVID-19 can suffer long-term health issues related to the disease — compromised lungs, brain damage, heart and kidney dysfunction. Without mandated coverage for pre-existing conditions, recovered coronavirus patients might be denied insurance, perhaps for decades.

That, apparently, is what Derek Schmidt and Eric Schmitt want.

They’ll deny that, of course. Both have said in recent months that Congress will “revisit” pre-existing conditions coverage if the Affordable Care Act is struck down. How? Republicans have had a decade to explain how they might provide that protection. We’re still waiting.

While filled with misinformation, the Supreme Court brief does provide a moment or two of clarity. At the end of the filing, the anti-ACA states ask the court to strike down the law in every state — not just in those that have signed on to the lawsuit.

Why? Because limiting the remedy “would force citizens of (those) states to heavily subsidize other states with their general tax dollars,” the brief says.

Wow. That’s exactly what Kansans and Missourians do now, of course: They subsidize states that have expanded Medicaid, while getting no benefits in return. We must remember to thank Schmitt and Schmidt for explaining how wrong that is.

Critics claim the two attorneys general want to end the Affordable Care Act for personal political reasons. Even as politics, though, the crusade seems wrong: Obamacare has never been more popular, and health care may be the most important issue in government for years to come.

And both men are wasting money. Missouri and Kansas are slashing their budgets, while the offices of their attorneys general pursue this silly crusade.

Derek Schmidt of Kansas and Eric Schmitt of Missouri are wrong to pursue this case: wrong on the facts, the law, logic, politics, and the needs of hundreds of thousands of people who live in their states.

They should drop the case.