Low-Wage workers blast Bill Schuette’s refusal to protect Medicaid

 
More than 100 Fast-Food Cooks, Head Start Workers, Healthcare Workers to Demand Next Governor Make Medicaid Expansion Permanent, Strengthen Healthcare for All
More than one hundred fast-food cooks, Head Start workers, healthcare workers and other voters across Michigan will flood the GOP gubernatorial debate Wednesday blasting candidate Bill Schuette’s refusal to protect vital healthcare for nearly 700,000 people who rely on the state’s expanded Medicaid program enacted under Republican Gov. Rick Snyder. The protest follows a recent vote in the state Senate to impose work requirements on all Medicaid recipients – a measure that Schuette has endorsed and vowed to implement if elected governor.
 
Holding signs reading, “Schuette: Hands Off My Healthcare” and “Bill Schuette: Healthcare Killer,” working people from across Michigan will demand the next governor make the state’s expanded Medicaid program permanent and increase access to affordable healthcare for everyone. The protest comes weeks after Schuette – who has received President Trump’s endorsement – released his first campaign TV ad reiterating his opposition to the state’s Medicaid expansion.
 
WHO: Fast-food cooks, Head Start workers, healthcare workers, other low-wage workers and voters across Michigan
 
WHERE: GOP gubernatorial debate, 120 College Ave SE, Grand Rapids, Mich.
 
WHEN: 5:30p ET
 
Background:
Guaranteeing healthcare for all and raising wages are emerging as top issues for Michigan voters ahead of the November election.
 
In April, hundreds of fast-food workers, janitors, healthcare workers and state and county employees hosted a forum in Detroit where all four leading Democratic gubernatorial candidates outlined how they would make it easier for more workers to join unions and raise wages across the state if elected in November. The April candidate forum followed a four-week blitz where Gretchen Whitmer, Shri Thanedar and Abdul El-Sayed spent a day shadowing union and nonunion workers in service jobs across the state.
 
In January, as Snyder delivered his annual State of the State address, hundreds of janitors, hospital workers and fast-food cooks protested outside his office in Detroit delivering a “Workers’ State of the State” decrying the governor’s record of blocking minimum wage increases and gutting union rights. In February, a mass of workers drowned out Snyder’s annual budget speech at the state capitol as they outlined how the governor’s policies and the economic revitalization he is touting have failed working people throughout the state.
 
Gov. Snyder and Republican state lawmakers have waged a string of attacks on workers’ unions in recent years. Snyder has curbed workers’ ability to organize by signing a so-called Right-to-Work law in 2012. Snyder has also stripped cities of their right to raise the minimum wage and installed “emergency managers” to disenfranchise communities of color across the state.