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Writer's pictureAlex Kawa

Activists Want Chris Murphy to Support Medicare For All. Will He Listen to Them or to His Donors?

Two weeks ago, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) held a town hall in Guilford, Connecticut, where members of Medicare For All CT, an advocacy group pushing members of the state's congressional delegation to support the Medicare for All Act, encouraged him to cosponsor the Senate version of the bill, introduced by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). He called it "the most rational, most economical, most prosperity-raising plan of all," according to Joanna Heller, one of the activists with the group, and that "it could be 15 or 20 years for us to get there." However, according to the organization, after Murphy addressed his concerns with the bill and they combatted them, the senator "became so rattled that he simply stopped answering our questions and even resorted to having his handlers take our mics away." If Sen. Murphy seems to be on board with the idea of a single-payer health care system, why is he refusing to commit to cosponsoring the bill and pushing back against those encouraging him to?


The likely answer to this question lies in the organizations that gave to Sen. Murphy's 2018 re-election campaign. Aetna, Anthem, Cigna, Humana, and UnitedHealth Group are the five largest for-profit health insurance companies in the United States, and all contributed substantially to the senator in that election cycle. Aetna and Anthem donated $10,000 and $6,000, respectively, in PAC money to him, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. From Cigna, he accepted $1,000 each from lobbyists Ben Klein and John Michael Gonzalez, in addition to $8,000 in PAC money. Humana lobbyists Lauren Aronson and David R. Thomas also collectively gave $3,150 to his campaign. Meanwhile, UnitedHealth Group lobbyists -- namely Sarah Kuehl Egge, Steven Elmendorf, Barry LaSala, Tracy B. Spicer, Alex Sternhell, and Amy Tejral -- contributed $10,012 in total, their PAC gave $6,000, and family members of fellow lobbyist Kristina Kennedy donated $1,000.


Given these numbers, it is now easy to see why Sen. Murphy is reluctant to listen to his constituents and make his support for Medicare for All official. While whether or not he will cosponsor the bill remains to be seen, the people have made their voices heard to him, and hopefully, he will realize that their voices are the most powerful in the end.


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