Presidential Democrat hopefuls find themselves between a rock and a hard place as national union leaders reject their Medicare for All platform.
The Democratic Party voting base has been strung together with glue and duct tape for decades, continually trying to balance the whims of big voting unions against those of everyday constituents. Issues such as improved inner-city education through charter schools have been tanked in an effort to appease teacher unions and garner votes. The same holds true of national-level labor unions who also see Medicare for All hurting workers.
“A lot of union members are happy with their health plans, and of course there’s a fear of the unknown,” New York Times labor correspondent Steven Greenhouse reportedly said. “They say the devil we know is better than the devil we don’t.”
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka has gone on the record rejecting the type of universal healthcare packages put forward by the current field of Democrat hopefuls. His endorsement carries weight and a huge voting bloc heading into the 2020 elections.
“If there isn’t some way to have our plans integrated into the system, then we would have a hard time supporting it,” Trumka reportedly said. “We’d have a hard time supporting Medicare for All that eliminates union plans.”
Dues-paying union workers have traditionally balanced agreements between increased wages and improved healthcare benefits with management. The sudden and abrupt end of union plans would leave workers short-changed on wages and with worse coverage.
“There’s no question that ultimately we need to establish a single-payer system, but there has to be a role for those hard-fought-for, high-quality plans that we’ve negotiated,” Trumka reportedly said. “You can’t ask the American worker, who sacrificed wages and everything, to simply say: ‘Okay, I’ll accept this plan here.’”
Union boss Trumka also went on the record stating that the hard-fought benefit packages negotiated through labor unions likely deliver far-better coverage than a government-run system could offer. The field of more than 20 Democrat primary candidates find themselves scurrying to redefine their socialist healthcare positions to appease big unions.
Far-left Democrats such as Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders were among the first to backpedal after hearing big unions bristled. Sen. Sanders suddenly believes that benefits already in place through companies and backed by unions would play a role moving forward. Although Sanders said his healthcare policy revision would be limited, the move demonstrates the fear liberals have of losing union votes.
Candidates such as New Jersey Sen. Corey Booker also decided to change horses in mid-stream. Sen. Booker had fully backed Sanders’ call for nationalized-only healthcare. After union leaders such as Trumka balked, he too has become tremendously flexible on the significant party issue.
Currently, big unions such as the AFL-CIO have memberships that top 12 million across 50-plus sub-organizations. The position Trumka and others are carving out is a simple one — what’s in it for us?
“It’s going to generate huge savings for employers,” Trumka reportedly said. “The question will be: What happens to the savings? What we’re saying is our plans, we’ve negotiated hard. There has to be a way for us to recoup that.”
California Sen. Kamala Harris has also rewritten her healthcare platform to make unions a special class of Americans who would be relatively unaffected by a Medicare for All system.
“I’ve been listening to a lot of folks in labor who have said to me, ‘Look, we negotiated contracts where we’ve given up wages for these health care benefits, and under the Medicare for All plan, we would lose them or we would be certainly in fear of losing them,’” Sen. Harris reportedly said.
But the Democrat leading the field early, Creepy Joe Biden, returned to his seemingly endless campaign trail gaffes by regurgitating a major lie told by his previous boss.
“If you have a generous union-backed plan and you have given up union wages to get that plan, you can keep it,” Biden reportedly said.
Everyday Americans know full well that Obamacare stripped many people of reasonable healthcare policies and replaced them with excessively high deductibles at increased premiums. Obama infamously told voters that if you like your primary care provider, you could keep your doctor. People saddled with Obamacare were routinely forced to find another physician.
What’s telling about the Democrats’ Medicare for All push is that it sounds good in theory. Soundbites that claim everyone would have coverage are enticing until people take a long look at the details. Voters may want to remember that Americans never saw the Affordable Care Act legislation until after it was rushed through by Democrats.
“We have to pass the bill, so that you can find out what is in it,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi famously said.
Given the backpedaling and kowtowing Democrats are doing to woo big unions, even they don’t know what’s in it.
