That's not an Obamacare-specific issue, it's actually the part of Democrats' so-called Colorado Model and related "Red to Blue Program" / "Swing State Project.
IT's an idea - which came around after 2000 and 2004 slim election victories of Geoerge W. Bush - of electing Democrats to the Secretary of State office in the swing states, so they can "win" close elections in those states:
SoSP's co-founders were Democracy Alliance member Michael Kieschnick (who also founded Working Assets and serves as a board member of the leftist evangelical group Sojourners); Becky Bond (who also had affiliations with Working Assets and the New Organizing Institute); and James Rucker (who co-founded Color of Change and formerly served as director of grassroots mobilization for MoveOn.org Political Action and Moveon.org Civic Action). ..... < snip > ..... To establish "election protection" against similar disappointments in subsequent political races, SoSP in 2006 targeted its funding efforts on the secretary-of-state races in seven swing states ― Iowa, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Colorado, and Michigan. As USA Today reported at the time: "The political battle for control of the federal government has opened up a new front: the obscure but vital state offices that determine who votes and how those votes are counted." Democrats emerged victorious in five of those seven elections―all except Colorado and Michigan. Politico.com would later characterize SoSP as "an administrative firewall" designed, "in anticipation of a photo-finish presidential election," to protect Democrats' "electoral interests in ... the most important battleground states." Because few Americans recognize the importance of the secretary of state's duties, candidates for that office tend to draw fewer (and smaller) donations than do most state-level campaigns. Consequently, even a modest injection of cash from just a handful of generous donors can make an enormous difference in the comparative financial resources of rival campaigns, and thereby tip the scales decidedly in favor of the better-funded candidate. Among the more notable contributors to SoSP were Democracy Alliance members George Soros, Rob Stein, Drummond Pike, Gail Furman, Michael Kieschnick, John R. Hunting, Paul Rudd, Pat Stryker, Nicholas Hanauer, Patricia Bauman, Megan Hull, Scott Wallace, Barbara Lee (not the congresswoman), Anne Bartley, Blair Hull, Rob McKay, Sanford Newman, William J. Roberts, Tim Gill, and Susie Tompkins Buell. The Secretary of State Project (SoSP) was established in July 2006 as an independent "527" organization devoted to helping Democrats get elected to the office of secretary-of-state in selected swing, or battleground, states; these were states where the margin of victory in the 2004 presidential election (between George W. Bush and John Kerry) had been 120,000 votes or less.1 One of the principal duties of the secretary of state is to serve as the chief election officer who certifies candidates as well as election results in his or her state.2 The holder of this office, then, can potentially play a key role in determining the winner of a close election.
It paid off later in Ohio and Minnesota, where SoS Mark Ritchie, a former "organizer," helped steal election from Norm Coleman and give the Senate seat to Al Franken.