Thousands Rally in D.C. to Challenge Health Insurance Executives
March 10, 2010
On March 9, with health-care reform legislation finally approaching its “up” or “down” destination in Congress, thousands of reform advocates, including members of organized labor, traveled to Washington.
Picketing in front of the Ritz-Carlton hotel, where the health insurance industry’s lobby was meeting, demonstrators were in no mood for quiet protest. Too many Americans, they said, were dying due to lack of affordable health insurance.
So, stretching yellow crime-scene tape along the sidewalk outside the building, the energetic and diverse crowd announced a “citizens’ arrest” of the insurance company executives who make millions on high premiums while men and women like Marcus Grimes suffer.
Grimes, a former English teacher from Virginia, told those assembled that he had lost his sight because he didn’t have health insurance to cover a $3,000 operation he needed. He told the crowd health care is the issue of this generation:
We are at the crux of our generation. This is our time. We ask you insurance companies. We ask you senators. We ask you representatives. What side of history do you want to be on? We should see no more people dying…We stand as one. We walk softly, but we carry a big stick.
Before leaving, protestors also left their mark on the blacktop in front of the hotel with pastel-colored silhouettes representing 45,000 people who die each year without health insurance. Joining the populist anger against corporate lobbyists, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said:
So today we’re here to put the insurance companies on notice: We will not allow you and your lobbyists to bully Congress into not acting. Not on health care or any of the issues important to America’s working families.
Photo used under a Creative Commons License from user healthcareforamericanow
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