Congressman Ellison, federal workers urge end to shutdown

Congressman Keith Ellison highlighted the stakes in the Republican-driven federal government shutdown at a Minneapolis news conference Monday, emphasizing that everyone is touched by federal programs and that the shutdown will impact not only federal workers.

The “government” decried by right-wing radicals, he said, is really people working to keep food and water safe to eat and drink and people caring for patients in Veterans hospitals.

Ending the shutdown, Ellison said, “can’t be a Washington, D.C. beltway deal,” but requires ordinary people nationwide to speak up against the tactics of a Republican Party hijacked by extremists.

He noted a recent New York Times story reporting how the shutdown was a strategy planned months ago to attempt to stop the implementation of the Affordable Care Act.

Ellison warned people to beware of attempts to blame both President Barack Obama and the Republican leadership for the shutdown. The Republicans, he said, “want the public to be confused about who did this… They win if people say ‘a pox on both their houses.'”

Other speakers at the news conference emphasized the personal impact of the shutdown.

Starting October 8, 100-150 workers would be furloughed at the Veterans Administration offices in Minneapolis because of the partial government shutdown, said Vicky Sirovy, president of American Federation of Government Employees Local 1969, which includes 2,200 workers. “We don’t want to be shut down,” she said. “As an employee of the federal government, I want to be able to take care of veterans.”

State Representative Phyllis Kahn noted that the shutdown “disproportionately affects women” as workers and as beneficiaries of government programs.

Denise Welte, organizing director for SEIU Local 284, shared how the shutdown is affecting her family. “I have two children supporting their two families,” she said, including her daughter who has worked four years at the Rochester federal correctional facility and her son-in-law who has worked there two years. “They have mortgages to pay and children to feed… This is insane.”

“We want to get back to work. We take great pride in what we do,” said Lois Baker, who works for the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Ellison said he opposed Republican proposals to re-open specific federal programs to appease targeted constituencies. “They shut down the government all at once… If you want to open it, open it all at once.” Allowing piecemeal reopening he said, would be a classic “divide and conquer” approach to the crisis.

Ellison said the Republican effort to shut down the government in an attempt to derail implementation of the Affordable Care Act is reprehensible. “The fight here is not because the Republicans think [the Affordable Care Act] won’t work but because they think it will work.”

He added: “Shutting down the government — shutting down 800,000 people and all the people who rely on those services — is not the act of a rational person.”

“Each and every one of us has a responsibility to call our representatives,” said Donna Cassutt, director of Minnesotans for a Fair Economy, a labor-community coalition which represents 250,000 members in Minnesota.

The 2012 presidential election, Cassutt noted, was largely a referendum on the Affordable Care Act, and President Obama won re-election by a wide margin. The Republicans’ federal government shutdown tactic “is the height of irresponsibility,” she said.