Covered California director to step down in February

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — The director of Covered California said Thursday he will step down early next year, prompting a national search for a new leader of the nation's largest state-based health insurance marketplace.

Peter Lee has been Covered California's only executive director in its nine-year history, launching the marketplace in 2012 at a time when the Affordable Care Act was a polarizing force in U.S. politics.

During his tenure, Covered California dramatically expanded the number of people eligible for discounts in their monthly health insurance premiums. A record high 1.6 million people in the state with a population of about 40 million people now buy their health insurance through Covered California. That helped to reduce the state's uninsured rate to 7.7% in 2019 from 18.5% in 2010, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Lee, 62, said the recent deaths of his mother and uncle caused him to pause and reflect on what he wants to do with the next phase of his life. He does not have another job lined up.

“Covered California has been in many ways the beacon of showing how the Affordable Care Act can work,” Lee told The Associated Press in an interview. “The organization is in great shape and I want to look at something new.”

Health insurance marketplaces are a key component of the federal Affordable Care Act, former President Barack Obama's health care law.

The marketplace is for people who don't have — or can't get — health insurance through their jobs and make too much money to qualify for government-funded health care. It was designed to make it easier for those people to get health insurance and offers discounts to some people who make below a certain income level.

Most states chose to let the federal government run their marketplaces for them. But...