During a conference call promoting the new Harry and Louise ads, Ron Pollack, the Executive Director of Families USA, revealed that the National Federation of Independent Business — a group which strongly opposed President Clinton’s health reform effort but now promotes changing “the status quo” — supports expanding public health programs:
In the conversation I had with Todd [Stottlemyer]….when I talked about…the problems with private health programs and their failure to meet people who in no doubt need support… I said to him that that it was a top priority for Families USA in terms of seeing change…[to expand public health programs]… He was not aware of that…[I told him] we are going to push really hard for that and he said he would support it.
Stottlemyer’s endorsement of an expansion of public health programs is a significant development and a welcome reversal from the group’s insistence that “Americans should receive their health insurance and healthcare through the private sector.”
Read more about the importance of public programs here.
Previous in TP Health
By clicking and submitting a comment I acknowledge the ThinkProgress Privacy Policy and agree to the ThinkProgress Terms of Use. I understand that my comments are also being governed by Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, or Hotmail’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policies as applicable, which can be found here.