Americans without health insurance surged with Trump—and plummeted under Biden

At the end of the first two years of Joe Biden’s presidency, 3.3 million more U.S. residents had health insurance than did so in 2019, according to a Capital & Main analysis of U.S. Census data conducted with the support of Thomas Data Consulting. That increase led to a 1.2% decline in the national uninsured rate and the lowest rate of residents without health insurance in U.S. history.

By contrast, Donald Trump oversaw an increase of 2.3 million uninsured people during the first three years of his presidency and a 0.6% increase in the national uninsured rate.

Health care affordability may not dominate the media coverage of this year’s presidential campaigns, but it remains a critical issue for many Americans, with 57% describing it as a “very big problem,” according to a Pew Research Center survey released in May. Health care is especially unaffordable for the roughly 27 million people who still lack insurance. That unaffordability makes uninsured people more likely to skip or delay medical treatment, leading to worse health care outcomes, according to a KFF report.