The moment for us to act quickly and loudly has arrived. It’s time for us to raise an immediate ruckus with members of our city and region’s congressional delegation who belong to the House Republican Majority:

• Long Island – Nick LaLota (NY-1), Andrew Garbarino (NY-2), George Santos (NY-3), Anthony D’Esposito (NY-4)
• NYC – George Santos (NY-3), Nicole Malliotakis (NY-11)
• Hudson Valley – Mike Lawler (NY-17)

Last week, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy unveiled his draconian “Limit, Save, Grow Act” to address impending federal debt default that is anticipated to occur sometime in June or July. He wants to pass his bill this week.

Here’s what his bill will do:

• Lift federal debt limits only until March 31, 2024 or by $1.5 trillion (whichever comes first.)
• Slash federal spending back to FY 2022 levels (thereby negating last December’s FY 2023 bipartisan budget deal), and then cap the annual growth rate for discretionary programs (that are subject to the annual appropriations process) at 1% per year for the next decade (through FY 2033.)  Defense and VA spending would be exempted.
• This combination of slash-cap-exempt would cause a whopping 59% cut in spending for everything else over the decade.  The affected programs would cover everything except “mandatory programs”, such as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, SNAP (formerly, Food Stamps), TANF (welfare.)  (However, funding for the agencies that administer these programs would be cut.)
• Add work requirements for Medicaid, SNAP, and TANF, just to just throw people off these programs.
• Take back still-being-spent pandemic funds provided to states.
• Cancel student loan forgiveness programs.
• Cancel new funding for the IRS to audit wealthy tax cheats.
• Curtail the federal government’s ability to regulate many industries.
• Repeal green energy tax credits and subsidies offered under the new Inflation Reduction Act law.
• Ignore what causes climate change and boost domestic fossil fuel development and use instead.

Bad bonuses: This bill would also be combined with other legislative promises to:

• Continue the Trump tax cuts for the wealthy in perpetuity. That would add over $3 trillion more to the federal debt over the next decade, thereby wiping out any alleged savings from McCarthy’s bill.
• Repeal the Medicare Rx drug price negotiation provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act, costing a loss of another $316 billion in savings from under that law.

Speaker McCarthy wants the House to vote on his bill before the end of this week IF he can summon up enough votes from his colleagues. Our job RIGHT NOW is to stop that from happening – we must prevent him from getting the votes he needs by causing a public uproar. If we succeed, we will dramatically weaken him and his majority in trying to do similar things in the future.

What to do NOW:

• Inform your networks about this bill and the fast timeline to try to pass it.
• Mobilize your networks to bombard the Capitol Hill and local district offices of these members of Congress (see list above) with messages to reject Speaker McCarthy’s debt default bill. Contact them by phone (Capitol switchboard: 202-224-3121) and on social media platforms to express your opinion.
• Use the webpages of these Reps. on the House website to write them an email and find out their local phone numbers.

Thanks much for stepping up to the plate right away at the crucial moment!

PS — Want more detail and background? Check out this analysis from our friends at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

55 years ago today, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis. We all continue to be inspired by his life example, readings, and writings. His most famous quote on health care is: “Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhuman.”

Several key health care proposals we are pushing to include in this year’s final New York State budget deal will help advance health equity:

• Expand public health insurance coverage for ALL low-income immigrants (“Coverage for All Act”).
• Eliminate asset tests for low-income people on Medicare who apply for Medicaid wrap-around coverage.
• Improve and streamline state-funded hospital financial assistance programs to prevent patients from incurring unnecessary medical debt (“Ounce of Prevention Act”).
• Ban health care providers and debt collection agencies from reporting patient medical debt to credit rating agencies (“Fair Medical Debt Reporting Act”).
• Redirect indigent care pool funding to safety-net hospitals that serve large numbers of low-income patients on public insurance programs or who are uninsured.
• Increase salaries of home and community-based long-term care workers to recruit and retain a sufficient and quality workforce (“Fair Pay for Home Care”).

Beyond health care issues per se, we are also pushing for:

• Full funding for the New York’s new public campaign finance program, to limit #BigDonor and special interest money in our elections, and strengthen constituent small donors to improve grassroots-driven democracy (“Fair Elections for New York”)
• Ending decades of sweetheart tax deals given to large corporations, special interests, and the ultra-rich, by requiring them to “pay what they owe” and “pay their fair share” of taxes (“Invest in Our New York” package).

We won’t get to true universal health care without these vital election and tax reforms!

Thank you for all your outreach to Gov. Hochul and your state legislators on these issues! They are still alive and on the table in the ongoing budget process because of your advocacy. Your phone calls, emails, and social media posts matter, and they ARE having impact.

Broadly, issue advocates ARE maintaining and gaining ground (slowly-but-surely) in the budget process. Otherwise, a typical insider-only, special interest-driven deal would have already happened. So keep on keepin’ on!

Here’s some online links to easily take action:

• Coverage for All  (+ social media toolkit)
• End Medical Debt (+ social media toolkit)
• Fair Pay for Home Care  (+ more action steps)

It’s that time of year again here in New York – state budget crunch time!

…and everyone’s help is needed to get some important items in the final agreement due by the end of this week.

These proposals are on the table now, and together everyday New Yorkers can take action to keep them there.

• Provide public health insurance coverage for ALL low-income immigrants – include the “Coverage for All Act” (S.2237/Rivera, A.3020/Gonzalez-Rojas)
• Protect hospital patients from incurring medical debt that they cannot pay off – include the “Ounce of Prevention Act” (S.1366/Rivera) and “Fair Medical Debt Reporting Act” (S.4907/Rivera)
• Promote grassroots democracy, and counter #BigDonors in election campaigns by empowering small donor constituents – include full funding for New York’s new landmark “Public Campaign Finance Program”.

What people can do now:

• Call Gov. Hochul (518-474-and YOUR OWN State Senator (518-455-2800) and Assemblymember (518-455-4100.)
• Email Gov. Hochul, and YOUR OWN State Senator and Assemblymember (see contact page on their websites.
• Use social media to engage with these lawmakers (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.)
• Inform and ask others by social media, email, texting, and phone calls.

Here’s a couple of “click-to-call” links to use — they make it all quite easy!

• Ounce of Prevention Act
• Public Campaign Finance Program