An update from David Jordan, Executive Director of the Alliance for a Healthy Kansas
What a week.
Last week, Kansas was the center of national debate on health care. Senator Moran hosted three town hall events and hundreds of Kansans showed up to let him know that the Senate’s health plan, the Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA), was bad for Kansas.
Thank you for turning out and helping Sen. Moran and the rest of the country know that Kansans do not support this bill.
Right now, Senator Moran is opposed to the BCRA because it doesn’t work for Kansas – 120,000 Kansans would lose health coverage, others would have to pay more money for plans that cover less, and our health system, particularly in rural Kansas, would be crippled by over $1 billion in Medicaid cuts.
More importantly, Senator Moran knows that you care about the BCRA. You have been making your voice heard. Last week, hundreds from northwest and southwest Kansas turned out at Senator Moran’s events, thousands of calls were made to his office, and you’ve amplified your voices using social media.
The national media seemed surprised to see how engaged Kansans are in this debate. But I’m not surprised — I’m inspired by all of your hard work:
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I was inspired to see overflow crowds in Palco, including the pediatrician of Senator Moran’s grandchildren, who challenged him to come up with a better approach to health care.
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I was excited that more than 80 people filed into the Haskell County Courthouse in Sublette to express their concerns about efforts to eliminate pre-existing condition protections for Kansans.
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I was heartened by the crowd in Liberal that highlighted how the Medicaid cuts would impact rural Kansas, schools across the state, people with disabilities, and seniors in nursing homes.
During last week’s town hall meetings, not one Kansan asked Senator Moran to support BCRA. Not one. I’m not surprised. Kansans know a bad bill when they see one.
Today, we’ve heard that the Senate is working to make slight adjustments to the legislation and to rush it through before August, bypassing the full legislative process. We cannot let our guard down.
We need to continue to call Senator Moran to thank him for putting Kansans first and urge him to continue to oppose any Senate health plan that cuts Medicaid, makes health insurance more expensive, guts consumer protections, and hurts our rural health system.
Thank you for all of your work to make Kansas a healthier place to live. Let’s keep fighting. We can’t let up.
Sincerely,
David
PS – Please call Senator Moran today. http://www.expandkancare.com/