This is an excerpt of a column I wrote for Dome Magazine:
By Chad Selweski
What is it about Michigan congressmen and health care reform – why are they the center of attention and the target for detractors nationwide when this issue reaches a boiling point?
In 2010, Rep. Bart Stupak—an Upper Peninsula Democrat—struck a deal with the Obama White House just hours before the final House vote on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and succeeded in pushing “Obamacare” over the top. For that move, he became perhaps the most reviled congressman in America among several voting blocs until he quickly decided to retire from Congress after 18 years.
Earlier this month, Rep. Fred Upton, a West Michigan Republican, negotiated an amendment with the Trump White House less than 24 hours before the Obamacare repeal-and-replace vote, and that maneuver paved the way for a 217-213 House roll call in favor of the American Health Care Act, or “Trumpcare.” The immediate outfall elevated Upton to “Enemy No. 1,” from coast to coast, among lawmakers and health care organizations who denounce the AHCA.
Upton
Stupak
What’s been lost in the coverage of the spirited House vote are the undeniable correlations between Stupak and Upton as Michigan lawmakers who each dove into the political pit of controversy over health care–one to save Obamacare from drowning, the other to bury the Obamacare “status quo” six feet under.
Stupak, a pro-life Democrat from Menominee, led a group of other pro-life Dems on Capitol Hill in 2010 who held back their support for the ACA due to concerns about a potential loophole allowing taxpayer-funded abortions. He broke the logjam on the day of the final vote after President Obama promised to sign a compromise executive order that addressed Stupak’s objections to the bill.
In the aftermath, Stupak faced a legitimate death threat that prompted a criminal case, and admittedly he was accosted in airports and other public places for more than a year by people who recognized his face and grabbed the opportunity to “cuss (him) out.”
Continue reading here.
