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| Special Release | 07/30/15 |
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Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. Begins
South Carolina Manifesto, Medicaid Crusade in Rock Hill, South Carolina and
Spartanburg, South Carolina
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South
Carolina (July 28, 2015) — “On July 28, 2015, Rev. Jesse L. Jackson,
Sr., national civil rights leader and founder of the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, led
a spirited town hall meeting in Rock Hill, South Carolina, calling on Governor
Nikki Haley to reconsider her decision to reject nearly $1.2 billion in Medicaid
money for the state in 2016. Joined by State Representative John King and Former
State Representative James Felder, Rev. Jackson led a full crowd of Rock Hill
residents at the Freedom Center in a rousing call for Medicaid expansion.
The next morning, Rev. Jackson and
Former Representative Felder appeared at a leadership breakfast with State
Representative James Mitchell. City officials from Spartanburg, along with local
ministers, community leaders, and Greek Letter Organization members joined the
assembly.
Rev. Jackson praised
Governor Haley for removing the confederate flag from state capitol grounds, but
explained that South Carolina voters must understand the difference between the
cosmetic and the structural; the symbolic and the substantive. “The flag agenda
must come down with the flag,” Jackson said to thunderous applause. “The flag
agenda,” he continued, “is separation of races and denial of
resources.”
By rejecting the $1.2
billion in Medicaid money from the federal government for 2016, Governor Nikki
Haley guarantees that 23,000 people will not get cholesterol screenings, 6,500
women will not get mammograms, and 432,000 South Carolinians will not make an
annual visit to a doctor. The poor will not have prescriptions. The sick will
not have sedatives. The disabled will be unable to get treatment. The wounded
will not heal. Beyond race and beyond politics, Medicaid is a human issue and
right with literal lives hanging in the balance.
While the rejection of Medicaid invites fiscal and
medical death, an acceptance of Medicaid expansion promises life. 200,000 South
Carolina residents without health insurance, equally divided between white and
black citizens, will have access to hope and healing. The state’s leading
hospital associations support Medicaid expansion because they accept that their
care and treatment rests on the foundational support of social services and
programs. A Medicaid expansion will bring 45,000 jobs to South Carolina.
“Medicaid gets us to look past
black and white and onto wrong and right,” Rev. Jackson told the Rock Hill and
Spartanburg audiences, pointing out the obvious that “we all need medical care.”
Medicaid and health care enable everyone to aspire toward social transcendence
and political togetherness: “We can leave the racial battleground to find
economic common ground and reach for moral higher ground.”
Rev. Jackson, Former Representative James Felder, State
Representative John King, State Representative Harold Mitchell, elected
officials across South Carolina, Hospital Association members, and Greek Letter
Organizations will continue their tour of the state, making stops in major
cities and small towns, to mobilize Medicaid support, attracting audiences and
gathering petition signatures. The crusade will culminate on August 28 in
Columbia, South Carolina, where Jackson and local leaders will issue a statewide
agenda. At the conference, they will elevate care and compassion for children,
the sick, the disabled, and the elderly at the highest place of political
prominence by demanding Governor Haley turn on the faucet, let the Medicaid
funds flow, and allow the healing to begin.
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The
Rainbow PUSH Coalition is a progressive organization protecting, defending and
expanding civil rights to improve economic and educational opportunity. The
organization is headquartered at 930 E. 50th St. in Chicago. For more
information about the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, please visit www.rainbowpush.org or call (773) 373-3366 |
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