Fighting Back: “Protect Our Care” – Democrats Call For ACA National Day of Action

February 18, 2017 JanF Editors' Choice, Fighting Back 20

The weekly Fighting Back post is also an Open News Thread. Feel free to share other news stories in the comments.

Found on the Internets – House Democrats’ Press Conference Ahead of ACA National Day of Action

Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi joined Co-Chair of the DPCC, Congresswoman Cheri Bustos, Congresswoman Barbara Lee, Congresswoman Judy Chu, Congressman Matt Cartwright and Congressman Darren Soto to hold a press conference call ahead of House Democrats’ National Day of Action on Saturday, February 18.

Nancy Pelosi:

Good morning, everyone. This is a pretty exciting time for us. Four weeks since the Inauguration of a new President. Eight years ago, on this day, President Obama signed the Recovery Act, which got us down the path already for moving toward health care for all by having the electronic medical records contained in it already. He had signed SCHIP to cover many children in our country. Progress was already made on this four-week anniversary. Oh, and Lilly Ledbetter – did I mention that?

“But I didn’t want the morning to pass without acknowledging what this date meant eight years ago. It also began our path toward health care for all Americans as a right, not a privilege for the few. Inspired by so many and seeing the urgency – and captured best by Dr. Martin Luther King when he said, ‘Of all the forms of injustice, of all forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most inhumane.’ […]

“[February 18th] will be our centerpiece day for events – town halls, real hospital visits, roundtables and many things in between. The American people are mobilizing against the Republican assault on affordable health care, but Democrats will keep fighting to ensure that health care is right of every American, while Republicans want to Make America Sick Again.

(Link to Nancy Pelosi Newsroom here)

Also in the news, House Democrats spoke about the ICE raids and the unprecedented level of disdain shown to their concerns by both the Republican leadership in the House and the White House.

House Democrats spoke to reporters following a meeting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Acting Director Thomas Homman on immigration raids and deportations happening in several states. They expressed concern about how the Trump administration controlled their opportunities for meeting and about some of the recent apprehensions and deportations being conducted by the agency around the country against undocumented immigrants.

Nancy Pelosi on the raids, and before the “meeting”:

In the past week we have witnessed ICE raids across our nation targeting parents, students, and a DACA-protected DREAMer. We talked about some of this yesterday with our Members. We have seen press reports of federal immigration agents [who] went to the El Paso County Courthouse and arrested an undocumented woman who had just received a protective order after suffering domestic violence. The agents apparently detained the woman after receiving a tip, possibly from her alleged abuser.

What is this? You know, it’s supposed to be that they are only supposed to be – well, in one case ICE even lay in wait for undocumented immigrants outside a church hypothermia shelter. These are some places in the churches and all the rest that we’re really supposed to be more respectful of.

The only result of the Trump Administration’s cruel and arbitrary approach is to instill fear in our immigrant communities. We all share the responsibility of protecting the American people and doing so to protect and defend the Constitution of our country. ICE must focus on removing violent criminals, not on dividing law abiding families.

~

This week’s press briefing:

(CSPAN link to Weekly Democratic Address: here – available at 5:25pm Central Time)

Bolding added.

~

20 Comments


  1. Nancy Pelosi statement on ACA marketplaces:

    “From day one, President Trump and his Republican allies have tried to pour uncertainty into the insurance marketplaces that provide affordable health coverage for millions of Americans. Now, Republicans are trying to use the withdrawal of a small handful of insurers as a cynical pretext for their radical plans to dismantle the health coverage of every American – including those insured through their employers.

    “On his first night in the White House, President Trump issued an incoherent and incomprehensible executive order on the ACA that bewildered insurers. In a brazen effort to depress enrollment, the President abruptly canceled much of HealthCare.gov’s advertising and outreach, and is now trying to cut the open enrollment period in half. Meanwhile, the Republican Congress continues to talk about repealing the Affordable Care Act without having any consensus on a replacement plan – increasing the uncertainty of insurers and other stakeholders.

    “Millions of people have enrolled in insurance plans through the ACA Marketplaces. Any uncertainty in the insurance marketplaces is a direct result of Republicans’ willful and cynical actions. Democrats will continue to stand our ground to ensure that every American has access to affordable health coverage.”

  2. Next week, the Democrats will meet to elect new DNC officers:

    Next week, DNC members from across the country will gather at the DNC’s Winter Meeting in Atlanta, where the party will elect new officers and focus on ensuring all Americans have access to a good job with good pay, affordable health care, a secure retirement, and a quality education for their children.

    The DNC Winter meeting will begin on Thursday, February 23 and will conclude on Saturday, February 25. Over the course of three days, DNC members will participate in caucus, council, and committee meetings as well as training sessions. There will be two general sessions: one on Friday, February 24 at 10 a.m. to discuss party business, and another on Saturday, February 25 beginning at 10 a.m. to elect new DNC officers.

    The DNC Winter Meeting general sessions, including the election of officers, will be open to the press and the public and will be livestreamed on Democrats.org and on social media for maximum audience participation.

    Contrary to popular belief, this will not be a battle over the soul of the Democratic Party – the DNC chair does not pick candidates or write the platform. This will be about putting in place the leadership needed to rebuild the 50-state strategy, win statehouses and Congress and put in place the infrastructure that will insure that our party has a say in how America is governed.

  3. In the News: Presidential Historian’s Survey 2017

    Total Scores/Overall Rankings
    President’s Name Score
    Abraham Lincoln 906
    George Washington 867
    Franklin D. Roosevelt 854
    Theodore Roosevelt 807
    Dwight D. Eisenhower 744
    Harry S. Truman 737
    Thomas Jefferson 727
    John F. Kennedy 722
    Ronald Reagan 691
    Lyndon Baines Johnson 686
    Woodrow Wilson 683
    Barack Obama 668

    • I’d put LBJ far above Teddy and Eisenhower! LBJ was responsible for more equal rights legislation for women and African-Americans than Kennedy, Truman, or Ray-gun. These presidential historians clearly have a strong Rethuglican and classist bias.

      • Seems right-wing weighted. I am not sure why Kennedy makes this cut. It seems like dying in office overrides things done in office. I guess a generation saw him as “theirs” but I have never seen the attraction.

  4. In the News: Slideshow of The internment of Japanese-Americans

    First-graders, some of Japanese ancestry, pledge allegiance to the American flag at the Weill public school in San Francisco, April 1942. The children of Japanese ancestry would be housed in war relocation authority centers for the duration of the war. This week marks the 75th anniversary of FDR signing executive order 9066, authorizing the internment of Japanese Americans during World War Two. Dorothea Lange/Library of Congress

    Dangerous Criminal?

    Why does “never again” ignore the “never” part?

  5. From the NAACP:

    One hundred years ago, blackface and other offensive media representations of African Americans were not only common, but celebrated. Few cultural moments encapsulate this more fully than D.W. Griffith’s “The Birth of a Nation” (1915), a notoriously Ku Klux Klan-friendly reimagining of history.

    “Birth of a Movement,” a new film now streaming on PBS, tells the story of William Monroe Trotter, an African-American newspaper editor and activist, who, along with the then newly-formed NAACP, waged a battle against the film. Together, we unleashed a conflict that still rages today about race relations, representation, and the power of Hollywood.

    Narrated by Danny Glover and featuring interviews from Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Spike Lee, “Birth of a Movement” captures the backdrop to this clash between human rights, freedom of speech, and a changing media landscape.

    Preview:

    Full film from PBS through March 9th:

    Birth of a Movement

  6. Thanks for the roundup, JanF – I frequently just read and rec, but I really want you to know how much I appreciate the work you do in putting these together each week. Especially now when we are hanging onto our values and our hope with teeth and toenails.

      • Thanks, Jan. I appreciate these posts as well. I seem to have less and less time to read and rec, let alone post, because of my rampaging personal life, but I’m hoping things will settle down soon.

        • Every day I wake up thinking that this will be the day, post election, that my blogging muse will align with my available time. It hasn’t happened yet. These at least require me to see what Democrats are up to since their doings are not often reported in local and national news.

  7. In the News: Nobody Seems To Have Liked Working For Donald Trump’s New Labor Pick

    If confirmed, Acosta would lead more than 17,000 employees as secretary of labor, a position meant to protect the rights of American workers. The Labor Department was established in 1913 ― two years after the infamous fire at New York’s Triangle Shirtwaist Factory left 146 people dead ― following decades of bloody clashes between workers and industry barons. As secretary, Acosta would be tasked with improving wages, benefits and working conditions for U.S. workers, and administering more than 180 federal laws and thousands of regulations.

    But his record during the Bush administration raises major questions about Acosta’s ability to oversee the proper enforcement of labor laws and regulations. Acosta’s name pops up frequently in a Justice Department Inspector General report focused on hiring practices in the Civil Rights Division, which Acosta headed from August 2003 to June 2005.

  10. Was it Tim Kaine who abandoned the 50-state strategy started by Howard Dean? That’s when I dropped my monthly contribution to the DNC and why I had initial reservations about TK as VP. More and more I’m thinking I don’t like Establishment Democrats. We need people who aren’t afraid to speak up and speak out.

    • It was David Freaking Axelrod and Rahm Freaking Emmanuel, who hated Howard Dean. They got their guy elected and were content to let the DNC infrastructure wither on the vine to settle petty feuds. There was just enough juice left in 2012 – and of course a wildly popular president – to get President Obama re-elected but no one did a post-mortem on 2010 and what had happened to the state parties as a result of that “shellacking”. Tim Kaine was named DNC chair but there really was no DNC as a partner for state party organizations – that was folded up when Dr. Dean left. Just an ATM after that.

  11. Every bad idea for health insurance is making a “comeback”. High-risk pools, a plan only a Republican could love:

    The argument in favor of high-risk pools goes like this: Separate the healthy people, who don’t cost very much to insure, from people who have pre-existing medical conditions, such as a past serious illness or a chronic condition. Under GOP proposals, this second group, which insurers fear might be expected to use more medical care, would be encouraged to buy health insurance through high-risk insurance pools that are subsidized by states and the federal government. […]

    Craig Britton of Plymouth, Minn., once had a plan through the state’s high-risk pool. It cost him $18,000 a year in premiums.

    Britton was forced to buy the expensive MCHA coverage because of a pancreatitis diagnosis. He calls the idea that high-risk pools are good for consumers “a lot of baloney.” “That is catastrophic cost,” Britton says. “You have to have a good living just to pay for insurance.”

    And that’s the problem with high-risk pools, says Stefan Gildemeister, an economist with Minnesota’s health department. “It’s not cheap coverage to the individual, and it’s not cheap coverage to the system,” Gildemeister says. MCHA’s monthly premiums cost policy holders 25 percent more than conventional coverage, Gildemeister points out, and that left many people uninsured in Minnesota. “There were people out there who had a chronic disease or had a pre-existing condition who couldn’t get a policy,” Gildemeister says.

    Well, duh. And of course the Republicans plan to “provide” $25 billion over 10 years to pay for these pools, a figure that most analysts think falls about $175 billion a year , or $1.75 trillion over that 10 years, short. But it will result in people dying which is the ultimate goal of ACA repeal.

    • Hi, wordsinthewind!

      I have added your user account and you will be getting an email from “wordpress at motleymoose.net” with your account credentials. If you don’t get it, check your spam folder.

      Are you the same wordsinthewind who posted on the old Motley Moose before it moved to the WordPress platform?

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