Let's tell Senator Kerry we don't want a public option "trigger"

The Huffington Post is reporting that Senator Kerry has been floating the idea of a 10-year trigger for the public option.

In a closed-door meeting of Senate Finance Committee Democratic members and their staff Wednesday evening, Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) suggested that the committee bill include a ten-year delay between passage of health care reform and the implementation of a public option that Americans could buy into, according to two Democratic aides.

Under the plan floated by Kerry, a public health care option would only be triggered by private insurance companies failing to meet certain criteria after ten years. Known as the "trigger" in legislative lingo, the idea is vociferously opposed by health care advocates who consider it the death of reform.

Putting the public option on a 10-year hiatus is tantamount to not having the option at all. It is a terrible idea meant to give the insurance industry what they want while pretending that real reform is on the way. This is not the first time a so-called trigger has been suggested. The first I heard of it was a report that Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine, one of last so-called moderate Republicans, was talking up a 7-year trigger last month.

The Huffington Post report does go on to suggest that the idea got little traction in the meeting.

One source familiar with Kerry's unexpected suggestion said that the idea seemed to have little impact on the meeting and that the senators quickly moved on.

Nevertheless, I think this is an opportunity for us to have some local impact by contacting Senator Kerry's office to let him know that we want him to support a day-one robust public option. Here is the Senator's contact information:

Senator John F. Kerry
218 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-2742
Email Form