How to get insurance after cobra period?

My girlfriend had a job (W2 employee) with health insurance at the start of the year. In March, got a new job (contractor, 1099 role) and gave 3 weeks notice at the old one. Start of April she was being onboarded for the new job and on day 4 they dropped her contract (higher ups deleted the budget line without telling lower hiring managers – oops). So she never signed up for new insurance after leaving the first job in late March.

I told her Cobra has her covered for a while, and that we can sign up/pay premiums retroactively if something happens (I think that’s right?).

She then got a new job (W2) that started mid-May. In negotiations they said they give health insurance. Turns out their options are basically non-existent (not ACA compliant) and don’t kick in for 3 months(!!). Like, you start paying within 30 days but coverage doesn’t exist until day 82. The job is a 6 month contract. So this company (Apex, tech recruiters) let’s you get very minimal health “coverage” only for the last 3 months of the 6 month contract. (Don’t get me started on the “retirement match” they promised which caps at a max of $1K per year and only if you put in tens of thousands of your own).

So we want to get a marketplace plan for now. Except the marketplace qualifying events don’t seem to work here, and we get stuck on the website trying (Idaho marketplace to be specific). Change in income doesn’t seem to apply based on the timeline. How the hell do we convey to the bureaucracy that she left her last job voluntarily but then had insurance opportunity snatched from her by the second (cancelled on day 4) job and now it’s been more than 60 days (late March to late May…it’s June) since she was last covered.

We assumed the new job would offer health insurance because they said so, but starting on day 82 isn’t being insured. And the marketplace won’t let us get insurance. And cobra may be expired? (At the very least, cobra will be expired before the 82 days are up at the new job)

Is it literally impossible to get real health insurance in this scenario? Is she fucked for life if she has an accident? Why the hell wont the marketplace let people enroll year round or when they get a new job? This seems so heartless and fucked up.