Even I was shocked to hear that California Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez directed the California Highway Patrol to prevent our consumer group and an uninsured Massachusetts teacher from speaking out inside the Capitol against mandatory health insurance. The Capitol's famous rotunda is routinely used for press conferences by lobbyists and politicians.
Ron Norton, who cannot afford to buy health insurance under the Massachusetts law requiring all residents to purchase private insurance, was forced by the CHP to speak in the 38 degree weather outside.
Norton had joined with consumer advocates to release a new poll showing that only 16% of voters support the mandatory insurance purchases backed by Nunez and Governor Arnold Schwarzengger. (Read the poll results here.) Voters voiced strong support for insurance accountability reforms not incorporated in the NĂșñez/Schwarzenegger proposal.
Though they complied with the California Highway Patrol's order to leave the building, my colleagues Jerry Flanagan and Carmen Balber were later informed they are being written up for misdemeanors. They were also told our consumer group would not be able to speak to the press in the rotunda in the future. Nunez and the CHP will be hearing from our lawyers soon. (You can donate to help that effort here.)
The Capitol belongs to all of us, not the Speaker of the Assembly. The fact that Speaker NĂșñez thinks so little of the uninsured that he is willing to throw them out in the cold rather than have their voices heard in the Capitol speaks volumes about the true intent of his health care plan. It's also a metaphor for everything that's wrong with Nunez's mandatory purchase plan: it polices the uninsured, not the insurance companies.
Today's State Senate Health Committee hearing on the Nunez uninsured policing plan by Senator Sheila Kuehl has been rescheduled for next week. There's still time to weigh in with a fax. But don't be suprised when the California Highway Patrol knocks at your door.