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Thursday, December 6, 2007

Reichert & SEIU

posted by on December 6 at 9:19 AM

Originally posted late yesterday afternoon.

In my column this week, I report the news that Rep. Dave Reichert met with David Rolf, President of Washington state’s service employees union, SEIU 775, last week.

It’s the first time since taking office in 2004 that Reichert felt the need to meet with the local lefty powerhouse. (Reichert suggested the meeting.)

Is it a sign that Reichert’s running scared? Well, while I found that Reichert does seem anxious about challenger Darcy Burner—which might push him to meet with a get-out-the-vote powerhouse like SEIU—he did have a legitimate gripe with the union, and his staff made a compelling case that he sincerely wanted to set them straight.

I didn’t have the room in my column to go into all the details, but basically, SEIU did a robo call last August trashing Reichert for voting wrong on the House’s first vote on children’s health care, S-CHIP. Reichert supported a different version of the bill—one that included a subsidy for private health insurers to take over a portion of Medicare. Reichert’s office told me they, “don’t care about the iedeology” of private insurers vs. government insurance and simply wanted to “make sure 14,400 seniors in the 8th district didn’t lose health insurance.”

The Senate version put the Medicare portion back in the bill, and Reichert voted for that version when it came up in the House. That’s the version President Bush vetoed (because he didn’t like expanding eligibility to children from middle-income families). Reichert voted with the Democrats to override Bush’s veto.

Reichert sent a letter to SEIU (before the meeting) demanding an apology for the robo-calls, saying SEIU mischaracterized Reichert’s position on SCHIP.

Here’s a copy of the letter Reichert sent to the union demanding the apology.

Reichert also reiterated his demand for an apology in his meeting with Rolf.

Rolf told Reichert during the meeting that SEIU would not apologize, but the union would be happy to respond to Reichert’s letter.

SEIU hasn’t sent off a letter yet, but Rolf tells me SEIU stands by their objection to Rep. Reichert’s first Nay vote on SCHIP—that bill didn’t include the subsidy to private insurers.

But they also applaud Reichert’s follow-up votes—sending the President a strong message about children’s health care.

RSS icon Comments

1

Josh, it's Medicaid not Medicare. Children don't qualify for Medicare.

Posted by ahava | December 5, 2007 4:52 PM
2

It sounds to me like Reichert has a legitimate beef with SEIU. They're blowing up the first vote into a bigger deal than it is.

Posted by Greg | December 5, 2007 4:56 PM
3

Ahava @1,

I'm hep to the difference between Medicaid and Medicare.

However, the SCHIP bill (a component of children's Medicaid) had a Medicare component to partially privatize Medicare. Reichert supported that. Lots of Dems, initially, did not.

Posted by Josh Feit | December 5, 2007 4:58 PM
4

"I’ve got some interesting news in my column this week"

Nope, you lost me there.

Hat tip to comment 23 w7ngman on "Awkward" post by Lindy West

Posted by Awkward Trumps Conceited | December 5, 2007 5:10 PM
5

How about Reichert explaining away the fact that, whatever his vote on one item, he has consistently voted with the President and the Republican bloc on issues that damage not just children but all Americans?

Posted by Fnarf | December 5, 2007 6:28 PM
6

I really don't know the full details on this, but could someone look at his voting record to see if he has voted in a good way on anything where his vote actually mattered? I mean, it's great if he'll even pay lip (or vote) service to quasi-progressive issues, but has he ever been there when it was a relevant vote?

Posted by Juan | December 5, 2007 7:29 PM
7

@6 yeah, i mean his vote was basically meaningless since he knew Bush would veto it, we need to see meaningful votes, not this pandering psuedo-moderate crap

Posted by vooodooo84 | December 5, 2007 8:31 PM
8

genius #7

Slog - Seattle's Only Pandering Pseudo-Moderate Crap

Posted by A. Birtch Steen | December 5, 2007 8:52 PM
9

Juan - You hit the nail on the head. Reichert wants to get fluff good press for his Wild Sky bill, or his no-brainer Schiavo vote, but he has taken over 2200 votes in three years and he has always been there for Republicans when they've needed his vote on the major issues that face us.

BTW, on health care this year he voted against the Medicare Prescription Drug Price Negotiation Act (HR4), one of the Democrats First 100 Hours bills, he voted against the Children's Health and Medicare Protection Act of 2007 (HR 3162), a bill that 220 Democrats voted for and 194 Republicans voted against.

Posted by Daniel K | December 5, 2007 8:58 PM
10

Bzzt. He's a classic Bush Profile voter, and the Eastsiders need to turf him out on his lying, non-Green-River-Killer-catching, fraudulent ass.

Posted by Fnarf | December 5, 2007 9:07 PM
11

What Fnarf said @10

Posted by Will in Seattle | December 5, 2007 9:25 PM
12

Let me be exact: Reichert has taken 2278 votes. He needs to be made accountable for more than just one two votes, but an entire voting record that when actually studied with human eyes, as opposed to Perl scripts, show he consistently votes with his party when then need him to, and has voted against a number of the bills the eventually safely voted for in the end.

Posted by Daniel K | December 5, 2007 9:39 PM
13

The bill Reichert refused to vote for was going to prevent the privatization of Medicare by over-subsidizing private alternatives. That's why he didn't vote for it, because he wants to see Medicare destroyed. The bill he did vote for was a compromise with the Senate where the Democrats pulled the over-subsidy out of the negotiation.

SEIU has nothing to apologize for.

Posted by Matt Stoller | December 6, 2007 12:06 AM
14

Reichert has taken 2278 votes. why couldn't they use any number of those votes for their robocalls?

Posted by infrequent | December 6, 2007 9:58 AM
15

Go get him, SEIU.

Go give him a list of his 2,250 bad votes.

Go tell him we are going to kick his ass out of office.

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