“Last year, Medicaid was just another word to me,” said Thomas (TJ) Buckley, after explaining to a small crowd in Northglenn how he’d been blindsided by a horrible disease that he’s been able to fight thanks to Medicaid, a federal health insurance program for low-income people. “I hope none of you ever have to learn why Medicaid truly matters the way I did. Today it means something entirely different. It means another appointment kept, another treatment received, another chance to plan for the future, another holiday celebrated with friends and family, another ordinary day that suddenly doesn’t feel so ordinary anymore.”
Buckley explained that his experience with Medicaid inspired him to speak up to save the program that Republicans in Washington voted to slash by $1 trillion last year.
“I also learned that one policy decision can change whether life remains affordable,” said Buckley to the crowd. “That is why I accepted the invitation to speak today. To turn me into an advocate, and if I need to be that face and that voice, then I shall be.”
Buckley told his story in front of a crowd gathered in Northglenn this morning to mark the 61st birthday of Medicaid by denouncing U.S. Rep. Gabe Evans (R-CO) for voting with fellow Republicans for the Big Beautiful Bill, which will throw an estimated 100,000 Coloradans from the health care program in the coming years.
Adam Fox, deputy director of the Colorado Consumer Health Initiative, also spoke to the crowd of about 25 people, standing around covered picnic benches in Donahy Park, in the western part of Colorado’s 8th Congressional District (CD8), where Evans will face Democrat Manny Rutinel in a swing congressional race that will help determine which party controls the U.S. House after the midterm election.
“We’re here in the 8th Congressional District, where roughly one in four residents relies on Medicaid, and yet Representative Gabe Evans not only voted for [Medicaid] cuts in HR 1, but has defended them and claims falsely that his vote did not cut Medicaid. We’re here to hold him accountable for the harm of these cuts and what they will mean in CD8, across our state, for thousands of Coloradans, and to our health care workers and providers.
“And why did Republicans make these cuts? To pay for tax breaks that benefit the rich and mega corporations. This is a healthcare heist.”
Caroline Nutter, policy manager of Colorado Fiscal Institute, a progressive think tank, echoed some of those themes in her speech to the rally, adding that the money saved by the health care cuts went to the wealthiest people in America.
“Last year, Representative Gabe Evans, whose district we currently stand in, voted to cut taxes for the wealthiest individuals and corporations in the country,” Nutter told the booing crowd. “In its first year, this tax cut benefited the top 1% 1000 times more than it benefited the bottom 20%. And how were these tax cuts funded? By slashing the budgets of Medicaid and SNAP, [a program that provides food for low-income people]. That’s right. Representative Gabe Evans voted to give a tax cut to the 1% financed by cutting your health care.”
In a rousing speech, Rebecca Miller, a nurse, said she feels like Medicaid cuts are like cannonballs attacking her and making it difficult to provide care. But she’s ready to fight back, she said, retelling a story from Rev. Jesse Jackson.
“He said that David went up against Goliath, and as a refresher for those who’ve been to Sunday school and forgot about this cat, he was this big dude who was terrorizing his neighborhood, and nobody knew what to do. And this kid David comes up, and he picks a rock off the ground, puts it in a slingshot, and lands the perfect shot, and takes out the problem. Rocks lying all around, and Reverend Jackson said the rocks that lying all around are unclaimed votes. People who didn’t register to vote. People who didn’t vote. People who thought, “Well, maybe I will vote, but maybe not this time. Rocks laying all around.”
“I’ve got cannonballs coming at me in all directions,” Miller told the crowd. “And I need you to look at yourselves and think that rock is your vote. It’s your voice. It’s your email. Your phone call. You’re showing up. You’re being here. You’re standing up and saying, ‘We the people resist, because a nation’s strength is built on how we care for the least vulnerable.’ That is a sign of our strength.
“Make sure you guys get your friends to vote. Pick up those rocks, because guys, I’m telling you what, if we all pick up those rocks together, and load our slingshots together, and we all fire those off together, we will have the strength of 1,000 cannonballs, and we can reclaim our rights, and we can save our democracy, and we can restore health care to the people who need it the most.”
Evans’ office didn’t respond to a request for comment.
One rally-goer, Donna Smith of Denver, attended mainly because of Evans.
“Representative Evans would rather represent Donald Trump than represent his constituents, and that worries me greatly,” Smith told the Colorado Times Recorder. “I have a grandson with a developmental disability. His parents are extremely worried about what will happen to him, as we are too.”
