"Blocking Healthcare Reform Is A Crime!"

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)

As health insurance lobbyists holed up in the Ritz-Carlton behind dozens of police in riot gear, thousands of healthcare activists surrounded the downtown DC hotel yesterday in a peaceful but pointed demonstration of anger and support for healthcare reform, sponsored by Health Care for America NOW (HCAN). The entire crowd was "deputized" to make citizen's arrests of insurance lobbyists for blocking healthcare reform. "When insurance companies come together to stop healthcare reform, that's a crime," said AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka (left, pointing) as the crowd roared. "Congress should, Congress must, and Congress will listen to the people." Change To Win Chair Anna Burger, whose union, SEIU, includes a million health care workers among its 2 million members, was blunt.  “They have the nerve to sneak here in the dead of night to plot against us,” she said.  “We’re here to call them out for their crimes against humanity …Every half hour in America, someone dies because they don’t have health insurance. Declaring the Ritz a "crime scene" because of the insurance lobbyist meeting being held there by America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), Trumka led a delegation of leaders to deliver an arrest warrant on leading insurance lobbyists. Blocked from the Ritz entrance by barricades and riot police, the delegation scaled nearby planters and led the crowd in deafening chants demanding "arrest the real criminals!" while others taped off the building with bright yellow tape emblazoned "It's A Crime To Deny Our Care." The crowd massed in front of the Ritz was a colorful and festive cross-section of the nation, as clergy, community organizations, union members and citizens gathered from across the country. "There's too many people in this country who are dying because they don't have healthcare," Wayne Rentzel of York, PA and a member of the Steelworkers District 10, told Union City.  "In the greatest country in the world, that shouldn't have to happen." Added Mary Wallace of Gold Hill, OR, "The for-profit healthcare system is immoral." Wallace declared bankruptcy and lost her home after she fell ill because she could not afford health insurance.  "They're making profits off people's deaths," she told Union City. Under blue skies and bright sunshine, with the beat of drums and the voices of thousands filling the streets, the message to the healthcare industry and to Congress reverberated through the nation's capital. Click here for more coverage on the AFL-CIO's Now blog.
- Paddy Lehane, with additional reporting by Mark Gruenberg, PAI; photos by Adam Wright