Meet Barry Wolfert: Running to Reclaim Georgia’s 11th Congressional District

Barry Wolfert is running for the U.S. House of Representatives in Georgia’s 11th Congressional District, the seat currently held by Barry Loudermilk. As North Georgia CAN evaluates candidates ahead of the May 19 primary, we sat down with Wolfert to hear where he stands.

Healthcare Is His North Star

Ask Barry Wolfert what he would do first if elected, and he does not hesitate.

“My top priority is to help get affordable healthcare for everyday working Americans,” he said.

But Wolfert is not content to leave it there. He came prepared with a plan. He wants seats on two specific committees: the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, which oversees federal healthcare policy, and the Ways and Means Committee, which controls ACA funding.

From there, he says he will “introduce or co-sponsor legislation to re-fund the enhanced ACA subsidies for three years while we work on a better, long term solution.” No vague promises. A specific bill, specific committees, a specific timeline.

The Story Nobody Is Covering

When we asked Wolfert what problem is not getting the attention it deserves, he pointed to something most politicians have quietly moved past: the collapse of ACA enrollment following the subsidy lapse.

“The ACA funding lapse was the center point of the first government work stoppage last November,” he said. “At that same time, the ICE incidents in Minnesota became front page news and eventually the showdown between Democrats and Republicans over ICE became the central issue and remains so. In the meantime, ACA funding has disappeared from the news and talking points of politicians.”

The numbers he cited are striking. Enrollment dropped from approximately 1.5 million in early 2025 to around 950,000 as of April 17, 2026. More than half a million people are now uninsured. Some left because premium hikes made coverage unaffordable. Others were automatically re-enrolled but, as Wolfert put it, “never made their payments,” because the new premiums were simply too high to sustain.

He sees this as a crisis hiding in plain sight, and he wants to be the person in Congress who refuses to let it stay buried.

Why This Matters to North Georgia

Georgia remains one of the states where ACA coverage has always been a lifeline rather than a luxury. In Cherokee, Pickens, Bartow, and surrounding counties, working families have felt the pinch of rising premiums directly. A candidate who names the specific mechanism of the crisis and shows up with a legislative plan to address it is exactly the kind of representation this district needs.

NGA CAN will publish our endorsements for the May 19 primary by May 16. Stay tuned.