Medicare for All – the Path to A Healthier America
I literally wrote the book on Medicare for All. And I am the only candidate for the U.S. Senate in Michigan running to guarantee healthcare for every single American. No one should have to choose between getting the care they need or going into debt in the richest, most powerful country in the world. I will fight to expand Medicare to cover all necessary healthcare, including vision, dental, and hearing, and extend it to every single American from cradle to grave without premiums, copays, or deductibles. Medicare should be automatic, for everyone, and accepted everywhere. Medicare for All does not have to ban additional private insurance through unions or employers, although Medicare for All should make those choices redundant and unnecessary.
Expanding Medicare and providing it to every single American would make it stronger. As a nation, Americans hold more than $225 billion in medical debt. I think it shouldn’t exist–and I erased it for upwards of 300,000 Michiganders in Wayne County. I favor abolishing it for every American immediately.
In the meantime, I categorically oppose the privatization of Medicare or the attempt to cut Medicaid or destroy the ACA market by cutting subsidies. We need to expand guaranteed health insurance, not sell it off to corporations or cut it. I will push to immediately repeal Medicaid and ACA subsidy cuts from the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill” Act.
I categorically oppose the use of AI to allow health insurance of any kind to second-guess decisions made by your doctor.
Veterans Affairs
As the former Director of Wayne County’s Veterans Services division, I hold solemn the commitment we have made to our veterans. I believe in expanding and improving the VA, not cutting it. I also believe that no veteran should go without housing, a good job, and an education. That’s why I support vastly expanding the services we provide our veterans to include them.
Break up Big Healthcare
I oppose the hospital mergers and acquisitions that are leaving Americans with fewer healthcare choices and nurses, hospital workers, and doctors with less power at their workplace. I want to empower the FTC to retrospectively review mergers and acquisitions and grant them the power to break up monopolies in healthcare. I support the Break Up Big Medicine Act.
We also need to expand public healthcare by investing more in federally qualified health centers and public clinics and hospitals.
Prescription drugs
It is absurd that we pay more for prescription drugs than any other country on Earth. It’s why I was proud to help design President Biden’s drug price negotiation policy that was passed into law under the Inflation Reduction Act. I support expanding that law to empower Medicare to negotiate prices for every single prescription drug, negotiate prices far earlier after drugs hit the market, and extend the ability to negotiate prices to all patients, not just those on Medicare. I also support public manufacturing of essential medications, such as insulin. I’ll take on the practice of excessive drug patents to stop Big Pharma from using legal tactics to extend their patents. And I will Ban the Middleman, ending pharmacy benefit managers who price-gouge us while offering no essential benefit.
Public health
Public health is critical to keeping us healthy and safe in our communities. If elected, I would be the first Democratic doctor elected to the U.S. Senate since 1969 and the first-ever public health official to serve in that body. Given all that RFK Jr. has done to corrupt our public health in this country, we need leadership with the expertise and experience to rebuild it. Public health must be led by science and free from political meddling. Appointments to critical leadership roles such as CDC Director, FDA Commissioner, and NIH Director should be similar to those for the FBI Director and Federal Reserve: they should be fixed-term appointments that cannot be removed except under specific circumstances. Further, any and all appointments to critical public health bodies, such as the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, should be made with the expressed consent of the Senate to protect their integrity.
Rather than gut critical institutions like the CDC, FDA, and Health Resources, and Services Administration, I believe in reinvesting and reforming them so that they are better fit for the 21st century. And I believe in vastly increasing support and funding for local and state health departments to meet the needs of their communities.
Healthcare freedom for women and LGBTQ+ Americans
Everyone has the right to make personal decisions about their healthcare. Healthcare decisions should be made by a patient (and their parents if they are a minor) and their doctor–no one else. That includes reproductive and gender-affirming care. I’ll fight to codify the rights once protected by Roe v. Wade into federal law. Further, I oppose any effort to criminalize certain medications and the use of lawfare or funding cuts to stop healthcare providers from providing full-spectrum healthcare that meet all the needs of their diverse communities.