BURLINGTON, Vt. – U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders said Sunday on Meet the Press that a recent wave of protests at town meetings hosted by Republican members of Congress are only the beginning of a grassroots uprising against efforts to cut health care.
Sanders told NBC’s Chuck Todd that more rallies are being organized throughout the country.
“This is a grassroots uprising of the American people.” Sanders said in announcing the Feb. 25 rallies that he and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York are organizing. “You’ll see people in conservative areas and progressive areas asking the Republicans what are you going to do when you throw 20 million people off of health insurance? How many of them are going to die? What’s your plan? What are you going do when you raise prescription drug costs on average $2,000 for senior citizens? Are you really going to repeal the protection against pre-existing conditions so people who have cancer and heart disease will no longer be able to get health insurance? You will throw kids off their parents’ health insurance program?
“Republicans,” Sanders added, “will have to start answering those questions and the American people are pretty clear, overwhelmingly, they want to improve the Affordable Care Act and they do not simply want to repeal it.”
Sanders, the Senate Democrats’ outreach leader, and Schumer on Saturday sent a letter to Senate colleagues calling on them to help organize the rallies against efforts by President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress to repeal the Affordable Care Act and take health coverage away from more than 20 million Americans.
“The Republican Party’s plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act is in chaos,” Schumer and Sanders said in the letter. “Public support for the law is at an all-time high, while the number of Americans supporting its immediate repeal without a replacement has dipped below 15 percent. It is critical we seize this momentum.”
