{"id":11346,"date":"2010-03-22T17:30:00","date_gmt":"2010-03-22T17:30:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2010-03-22T19:16:57","modified_gmt":"2010-03-22T19:16:57","slug":"loretta-sanchez-bows-to-massive-pressure-votes-yes-on-health-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/2010\/03\/22\/loretta-sanchez-bows-to-massive-pressure-votes-yes-on-health-care\/","title":{"rendered":"Loretta Sanchez Bows To Massive Pressure, Votes “Yes” on Health Care"},"content":{"rendered":"

Photo by Reggie Mundakis, Pacific Progressive<\/a><\/I><\/p>\n

By now you’ve probably heard that Loretta Sanchez (CA-47) was a “yes” vote on the health care bill last night. She put out a statement last night<\/a> explaining:<\/p>\n

But it was hearing the personal stories from people in my district that ultimately convinced me to support this bill. In my fourteen years in Congress, I have never seen my constituents reach out so intently and so persistently in support of a particular piece of legislation.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Much of that “intent and persistent” outreach was mobilized late Saturday night and early Sunday morning, after reports circulated<\/a> that Sanchez wasn’t on Capitol Hill and was being listed by House leadership as a “no” vote. The Courage Campaign, where I work as Public Policy Director, asked her constituents to call her offices<\/a> Sunday morning, an ask we later took statewide. OFA joined in, and even organized a protest<\/a> at her Santa Ana campaign office pushing her to vote for the bill.<\/p>\n

Reports indicated that about 250 people showed up to the office, including a number of folks who pulled over to join the protest after driving by it on Harbor Boulevard.<\/p>\n

Clearly the statewide mobilization targeting Sanchez played a role in getting her to vote for the bill. What we don’t know is just what her intentions were in all of this. Was Sanchez genuinely planning to vote no, or even undecided? Or was this an attention-seeking ploy on her part, as some have charged<\/a>?<\/p>\n

Whatever the answer, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that Sanchez has damaged herself with this whole affair. Her constituents will be happy she voted yes, but annoyed that there was any question about that outcome, and frustrated that Sanchez was playing coy with the media and the public up until the eve of the vote.<\/p>\n

Maryland Democrat and DCCC chair Chris Van Hollen has argued Dems should go on the offensive<\/a>, touting the bill and its benefits between now and the election. That’s particularly good advice for Sanchez, whose district has a 31% uninsured rate, 17th highest in the country.<\/p>\n

Whether a stunt or a genuine uncertainty about the vote, Loretta Sanchez damaged her standing in Orange County and among California Democrats. She’ll need to work to restore that support between now and November.<\/p>\n

You can see Loretta Sanchez’s full statement over the flip.<\/p>\n

March 21, 2010: Rep. Loretta Sanchez Issues Statement on Passage of Historic Health Care Bill\t<\/p>\n

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez (CA-47) today issued the following statement regarding her historic vote in support of H.R. 3590, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and H.R. 4872, the Reconciliation Act of 2010:<\/p>\n

“This was probably the most difficult vote I’ve cast during my time in Congress. After decades of failed attempts at reform, this Congress was given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to finally fix our broken health care system. And just like any once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, there was a lot of pressure to deliver a perfect bill, one that would be cost-effective and deficit-neutral while increasing health care quality and decreasing the number of uninsured.<\/p>\n

“Over the last few weeks, it has become clear that this bill is far from perfect. It does not provide a public option, which I believe is critical to achieving genuine reform. And it doesn’t adequately reimburse California hospitals for the cost of providing care to Medicare patients. So I had a choice: stand up for my ideal vision of health care and vote against this legislation, or accept a less-than-perfect bill because it is an important step toward improving our health care system from the unsustainable status quo. It is for this reason that I deliberated long and hard before casting my vote.<\/p>\n

“Everyone knows the purely rational reasons why we need reform. Rising costs are hurting our families, burdening small businesses, and making us less competitive in a global economy. But it was hearing the personal stories from people in my district that ultimately convinced me to support this bill. In my fourteen years in Congress, I have never seen my constituents reach out so intently and so persistently in support of a particular piece of legislation.<\/p>\n

“They called me with stories of children who died waiting for transplants and grandparents who couldn’t afford to pay for their medication. They wrote letters about pregnant mothers who couldn’t provide their babies with basic prenatal care and fathers who lost health insurance for their families when they lost their job. Just as touching were the calls from constituents who do have health coverage but were concerned for their neighbors who were not as fortunate. These were the people I had in mind when I cast my vote for this bill. Tonight, I stand by their stories and my decision.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photo by Reggie Mundakis, Pacific Progressive<\/a><\/I><\/p>\n

By now you’ve probably heard that Loretta Sanchez (CA-47) was a “yes” vote on the health care bill last night. She put out a statement last night<\/a> explaining:<\/p>\n

But it was hearing the personal stories from people in my district that ultimately convinced me to support this bill. In my fourteen years in Congress, I have never seen my constituents reach out so intently and so persistently in support of a particular piece of legislation.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Much of that “intent and persistent” outreach was mobilized late Saturday night and early Sunday morning, after reports circulated<\/a> that Sanchez wasn’t on Capitol Hill and was being listed by House leadership as a “no” vote. The Courage Campaign, where I work as Public Policy Director, asked her constituents to call her offices<\/a> Sunday morning, an ask we later took statewide. OFA joined in, and even organized a protest<\/a> at her Santa Ana campaign office pushing her to vote for the bill.<\/p>\n

Reports indicated that about 250 people showed up to the office, including a number of folks who pulled over to join the protest after driving by it on Harbor Boulevard.<\/p>\n

Clearly the statewide mobilization targeting Sanchez played a role in getting her to vote for the bill. What we don’t know is just what her intentions were in all of this. Was Sanchez genuinely planning to vote no, or even undecided? Or was this an attention-seeking ploy on her part, as some have charged<\/a>?<\/p>\n

Whatever the answer, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that Sanchez has damaged herself with this whole affair. Her constituents will be happy she voted yes, but annoyed that there was any question about that outcome, and frustrated that Sanchez was playing coy with the media and the public up until the eve of the vote.<\/p>\n

Maryland Democrat and DCCC chair Chris Van Hollen has argued Dems should go on the offensive<\/a>, touting the bill and its benefits between now and the election. That’s particularly good advice for Sanchez, whose district has a 31% uninsured rate, 17th highest in the country.<\/p>\n

Whether a stunt or a genuine uncertainty about the vote, Loretta Sanchez damaged her standing in Orange County and among California Democrats. She’ll need to work to restore that support between now and November.<\/p>\n

You can see Loretta Sanchez’s full statement over the flip.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-22"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pvhz-2X0","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11346\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}