Saturday, October 18, 2008

Cincy Working Families Keep Focus on Health Care, Tell McCain Not to Tax Workers’ Benefits

Posted by Media Release

Action Outside McCain’s Downtown Headquarters is Latest Push to Highlight Candidate’s Harmful Plan to Raise Taxes, Leave Millions Without Coverage

CINCINNATI, OH – SEIU and Change to Win members held a protest outside John McCain’s headquarters in Cincinnati today to educate voters on McCain’s harmful health care plan and to tell McCain not to tax workers’ health care benefits. SEIU members and voters in nearly a dozen other cities participated in similar actions in key battleground states. 

McCain’s plan would cost Ohio families up to $900 a year in additional taxes and discourage employers from providing coverage—leaving workers to fend for themselves in the individual market and resulting in 920,000 uninsured in Ohio alone. Nationally, McCain’s plan would cost families up to $1,100 a year in additional taxes.

“Hardworking Ohio families are struggling every day to survive without affordable health care—and John McCain wants to tax the folks lucky enough to have benefits in the first place?” said Craig Jones, SEIU member. “That’s not a solution for Cincinnati, not a solution for Ohio, and not a solution for this country.”

Recently, the Associated Press reported that while voters prefer Barack Obama’s health care plan to John McCain’s, many voters—particularly independents and seniors—do not have a clear understanding of the differences between the two proposals. Today’s effort is the latest push by SEIU members to step up efforts to educate voters on where the candidates stand on healthcare.

“With less than three weeks left before Election Day, SEIU members are focusing all of their energy on making sure voters know where the candidates stand on healthcare,” said SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger. “Working families simply can’t afford the disastrous plan John McCain is proposing—and voters need to know that.”

Specifically, SEIU members recently:

* Released a new ad in key battleground states educating voters on McCain’s disastrous healthcare plan (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4_M2bvQrY8);
* Mailed DVDs to more than 225,000 households in battleground states on John McCain’s disastrous healthcare plan;
* Helped host dozens of press conferences highlighting how McCain’s health care plan would impact key groups, such as women and veterans;
* Promoted a new state-by-state analysis of McCain’s proposal with the Center for American Progress; and
* Distributed a new side-by-side on healthcare to voters across the country.

SEIU also sponsored the first issue forum of the presidential campaign to focus on healthcare and launched the Road to Healthcare bus tour which traveled 8500 miles and held events in 17 states. Senator Barack Obama and six other candidates and elected officials across the country walked a day in the shoes of healthcare workers. 

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