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🚨 WISCONSIN: GOP legislature votes *tomorrow*—Thu 5/9—to rip Medicaid expansion out of the governor's budget. If they win, 82,000 people won't get coverage. $1.6 billion in public dollars won't return to the state. Individual market premiums won't be reduced. Time to fight. 1/
7 out of 10 Wisconsinites want to expand Medicaid. That's a supermajority. But the gerrymandered Republican legislature wants to keep people off of insurance, keep premiums high, and recklessly rip holes in the state budget to avoid giving Evers a win.
wbay.com/content/news/M…
wbay.com/content/news/M…
The wall of Republican opposition to expanding Medicaid already has cracks. GOP Sen. Luther Olsen said "I honestly think we have to take it." But Repub leaders are betting we won't fight for Medicaid now as hard as we did in 2017. Let's prove them wrong.
madison.com/wsj/news/local…
madison.com/wsj/news/local…
Basic human decency argues that Wisconsin should expand Medicaid. And it's also common sense. In opposing it, the GOP's contempt for fiscal responsibility is on full display. Let's make sure everyone in our state learns the stakes.
How can you help with this fight? Get on the phone. A great new group called @Forward_Wisc is organizing a mass conference call at 7pm CT on Thursday night to lay out the stakes & battle plan. Register now to get the dial-in: actionnetwork.org/forms/join-for… 
Near Madison? Come to the State Capitol tomorrow morning. 10:30am protest organized by @CitizenActionWI and @IndivisMadison. Then at 11am, go in and bear witness as Repubs on the Joint Finance Committee vote against their own constituents' health care.
facebook.com/events/1108290…
facebook.com/events/1108290…
Governor Evers has promised to "fight like hell" for Medicaid expansion. Let's fight by his side. Call your state legislators at 800-362-9472—and text "state" to 50409 (or DM "state" to @resistbot) to send a message. Tell them why it matters to you. Go!
Seriously: listen to your governor on this one.
The GOP vote to axe Medicaid expansion from the WI budget tomorrow isn't the end of the fight. It's the end of the opening act. The GOP legislature will pass its own budget. Gov Evers might veto it. Negotiations will continue. How we show up now shapes what happens next. Fight.
Friends outside WI: we know a lot is happening right now. We know DC is a train wreck. But your help matters. Amplify the news on this so everyone in WI finds out what the GOP is trying to do. Chip in for groups fighting hard, like @CitizenActionWI, here: citizenactionwi.org/emergency_rapi…
Ultimately, as 2018 showed, electoral accountability is the best line of defense on health care. But the GOP has gone to extremes to de-democratize Wisconsin. Which makes grassroots pressure now all the more vital. Turn it up, folks. In their disticts & Madison. The time is now.
Here in the Wisconsin Capitol room 412E, where the GOP-controlled Joint Finance Committee is voting to strip away plank after plank of the wildly popular People’s Budget proposed by @GovEvers. Every seat full. “Expand BadgerCare” stickers everywhere.
“Had my Republican colleagues expanded Medicaid from the beginning, it would have saved $1 billion for the State of Wisconsin. But they didn’t do it. Today, you can change your ways.” – @ChrisTaylorWI
“Infant mortality is some of the worst in the nation for African-American babies in the state of Wisconsin. ... it is unconscionable if you all deny the people of this state their needed health care.” @ChrisTaylorWI
Today, as the Republicans hacksaw health care out of the state budget, it doesn’t feel like a coincidence that the acronym for Joint Finance Committee is JFC.
@rep89 is currently arguing that Medicaid expansion is unnecessary because, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, “there already is very affordable coverage” (literal quote!)
Sen @JonErpenbach, quite rightly: “there is a big difference between access and affordability.”
Thanks to @LindaKMadison of @IndivisMadison for saving me an Expand BadgerCare sticker! Union-printed, no less.
$6/hour full-time full-year employment puts an individual right at the federal poverty line. Which, if we don’t expand Medicaid, means you get kicked off your health insurance. @JonErpenbach laying it out: “you’d love to pick up overtime, but if you do, you lose your healthcare.”
This is exactly the kind of trap that every lawmaker of any party should be proud to disassemble. And yet it’s exactly what the WI GOP is about to vote to preserve.
“When you have the opportunity to cover MORE people and save the state money at the same time, it’s a no-brainer!” – @StateSenLaTonya
@StateSenLaTonya notes that her jacket cost $19. She looks for deals so she can use the money for other priorities. Expanding Medicaid is exactly the same idea.
Rep. Goyke clearly touched a nerve - @repborn and @RepZimmerman both thanking Goyke for looking at their websites and now on defense. Claiming that they shouldn’t accept Medicaid expansion because of the federal deficit and “they ARE covered” and wages are rising etc etc etc.
@ChrisTaylorWI: “people in Wisconsin aren’t dumb, and that’s why 70% of them support Medicaid expansion.”
@SenStroebel asks why ACA subsidies start at 138% of poverty. “I’ve never gotten an answer to that.” Paging @emma_sandoe @onceuponA @charles_gaba @ASlavitt @TopherSpiro have a sec to help inform the WI debate on Medicaid expansion?
Watch: GOP votes down a motion to remove Medicaid expansion from the list of provisions to strip from the governor’s budget. Straight party line vote.
Reminder: today’s vote in the Joint Finance Committee doesn’t mean the battle is over. It means the battle is joined. Jump on the mass call at 7p tonight to hear about the next steps—register & get the dial in info: bit.ly/2VWqaIS
In the lame duck session,@ChrisTaylorWI points out, Republicans passed a law allowing themselves to spend unlimited amounts of public $ on private lawyers to advance their agenda—often for $820 an hour. They have no standing to talk about fiscal responsibility.
Just streamed this video, starting with @JonErpenbach and then going to me explaining the context of the fight for Medicaid expansion in Wisconsin:
pscp.tv/w/b6RhgDIyMDc3…
pscp.tv/w/b6RhgDIyMDc3…
