Edwards Launches Healthcare Ad in N.H.

ABC News’ Raelyn Johnson Reports: Former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., is releasing his universal healthcare ad in New Hampshire Monday — the same ad that went up in Iowa last week.

In the ad Edwards talks about his pledge to hold Congress accountable for passing universal healthcare within six months if he is elected President.

"When I’m president I’m going to say to members of Congress and members of my administration, including my cabinet: I’m glad that you have health care coverage and your family has health care coverage. But if you don’t pass universal health care by July of 2009 — in six months –- I’m going to use my power as President to take your health care away from you," Edwards says in the 30 second ad.

"We’ve seen plans fail before in Congress, and they will fail again unless we have a new approach," Edwards says, referring to his ’08 rival Sen. Hillary Clinton’s, D-N.Y., failed attempt to bring about healthcare reform when she was First Lady.

"We have to be willing to take on the drug companies, insurance companies, and their Washington lobbyists who killed reform the last time," Edwards says about the ad, blaming entrenched interest groups for helping to block the universal healthcare plan in the 90′s, when a democratic congress was in power.

If Edwards is successful, that would mean members of Congress like Sen. Tim Johnson, D-S.D., who suffered a stroke earlier this year, would lose their health insurance by July 2009 if Edwards’s healthcare plan is not passed.

Asked by ABC News whether he thought Sen. Johnson should lose his insurance, Edwards responded, "I don’t have the slightest question in my mind about whether Tim Johnson will vote for universal healthcare. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that whatsoever."

"What I’m talking about is going into congressional districts and the senate states, people who are defending their own healthcare and not willing to provide healthcare for Americans and I will do that," Edwards said.