[Peace-discuss] Yesterdays Rally at Rodney Davis office.

[Karen Aram]

Our newest member of the local Prairie Greens, David Engstrom, had a chance to express his opinion, which represents most of us in the Green Party, at yesterdays rally at Rodney Davis office. David Johnson, took the opportunity to distribute information in relation to Single Payer Healthcare, or Medicare for All, to the many people in attendance.

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Two vastly different points of view on ACA
Fri, 03/24/2017 - 7:00am | Nicole Lafond<http://www.news-gazette.com/author/nicole-lafond>
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Photo by: Heather Coit/The News-Gazette
As Kathleen Winters, of Urbana, mostly obscured, delivers a signed card to Rep. Rodney Davis's Champaign office staffer, her husband, Jeff Castle, standing in doorway, Loren Kirkwood, far right, of Urbana, and Meagan Glaser, far left, of Champaign, look on Thursday, March 23, 2017. A large group celebrated the seventh anniversary of the Affordable Care Act in front of Davis's office as they voiced concern for Davis's continued support of the American Health Care Act.

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CHAMPAIGN — As emotions stirred over Republican leaders' retooled health care plan, U.S. Rep. Rodney Davis took to the WDWS-AM airwaves Thursday morning with a familiar message.

The Affordable Care Act is "collapsing." Medicaid will cost the state of Illinois hundreds of millions more "in just two years." Repeal-and-replace time is overdue for Obamacare.

"I've got friends who have told me their premiums have gone up 87 percent," Davis told the WDWS Morning Show. "We've got 31 million people in this country that can't afford to use the coverage they have and hospitals right in Champaign and Urbana are writing off care of insured patients because the patients can't pay the $6,000 deductible that they have to pay before their health coverage kicks in.

"If we don't change and we don't help these people, then we are abdicating our responsibility as policy makers out here."

What started as a tense Thursday, with Republican lawmakers openly criticizing key pieces of the GOP's own bill, ended with President Donald Trump calling for a vote today on health care legislation in the House.

Make it happen, GOP lawmakers were reportedly told by Trump, or he'll just leave Obamacare in place as is and move on to other matters.

"I was at the White House with President Trump in a meeting in the Oval Office just this week, where he personally told me that he is fully supportive of what we're doing and he wants us to continue to work to fulfill his promises too — that we give Americans more affordable, accessible and usable coverage than what they have now under this collapsing system," Davis said on WDWS.

"I remember just a few short months ago, former President Clinton said Obamacare was a disaster, so this isn't just a Republican issue, but the president is fully engaged and in talking to him and hearing from him, we see that."

As Davis spoke from Washington, a vocal group of about 70 protesters gathered outside the Taylorville Republican's Champaign office. They ate cake celebrating the Affordable Care Act turning seven years old and defended its merits.

Among those who turned out for Thursday's rally: Loren Kirkwood, a self-employed Urbana resident who said he went 12 years without health insurance before the Affordable Care Act passed.

"Republicans are constantly driving Obamacare into the ground, claiming it's failing, claiming that it's a disaster, and it's not," he said. "It's working very well. It makes me very angry they're lying about it. There's no way you can afford insurance when you're self-employed."

Organizers didn't expect to see or hear from Davis on Thursday — they brought a familiar cardboard cutout of the congressman to serve as a placeholder — but they said they wanted to send a clear message anyway, even if it was just to his staff.

"It's the seventh anniversary of the Affordable Care Act becoming law and it's also supposedly the day the House is going to vote on the Republican replacement plan," Kathleen Winters said, speaking shortly before those plans were scrapped for the day. "A lot of the people here today have been positively impacted by the Affordable Care Act, and we wanted to take a minute to celebrate the achievements.

"I think it's vitally important. There's people in this crowd whose lives have literally been saved — I'm one of them — by access to medication, access to treatment. There's nothing in the new plan that equals those things."

David Enstrom, a member of the Green party, turned out for the rally despite his lukewarm feelings about Obamacare. He'd like to see it replaced with a single-payer system, but he doesn't want to see the law go away "in this fashion."

"We certainly don't want it to turn into what the Republicans are after," he said, adding that if Davis were more responsive to constituents, people wouldn't gather outside his office. "There's no opportunity to talk to this man at any level."

While Davis has no public forums planned locally, his office said he will host another "tele-town hall" Monday for people in his district. It's due to start at 6:30 p.m. and callers must sign up by midnight Sunday to participate, according to his office.
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