Lucy Gellman Photo
Holt at City Hall: Health care on “life support.”
When thousands of Connecticut women converge on Washington, D.C. this weekend, they will march for the Affordable Care Act, paid family and medical leave, Medicare and Medicaid, reproductive rights, and an end to domestic violence.
That message was delivered Tuesday afternoon at New Haven City Hall, where U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro and statewide advocates and organizers urged women to not only join marches in D.C., Hartford, and New York on Saturday, but to remain involved and informed as President-Elect Donald Trump takes office with vows to gut the Affordable Care Act, build a wall at the Mexican border, and end federal funding for Planned Parenthood.
Organizers reported that 80 buses are leaving Connecticut early Saturday to head to the big event, the Women’s March on Washington, which begins at 10 a.m. It is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of people.
“This march should symbolize for for all of us the first day, the very first day, in a very organized and a prolonged battle for America’s agenda,” DeLauro said. “An agenda that includes equal pay for equal work, affordable healthcare, paid family and medical leave, affordable safe healthcare, and protection from violence against women.”
“We are making ourselves heard,” she added. “We are opening the way for all Americans to get heard. That what this march is about.”
DeLauro (pictured) invited marchers to a post-rally reception Saturday at the Rayburn House from 2 to 5 p.m.
Accompanying her at the podium, several women shared that message, calling for a fight that should continue until Trump is out of the White House and Congress has been handed back to the Democrats. Trump and Congressional Republicans ahve begun carrying out a promise to repeal Obamacare (the Affordable care Act).
“The Affordable Care Act pumps lifesaving blood into Medicare and Medicaid,” said Kathy Holt, associate director of the Center for Medicare Advocacy. “If Congress votes to opt out of the health care system with no plans … all access to affordable health care in this country will be on life support.”
“We are in a fight for our lives,” declared Planned Parenthood of Southern New England President Judy Tabar.
Connecticut Voices for Children Executive Director Ellen Shemitz predicted that the annual cost of child care — currently almost $14,000 per child — would grow even more under Trump. She urged marchers who would to speak out over the high cost of care, and for the women who cannot already afford it.
Jillian Gilchrest (pictured), director of health professional outreach at Connecticut Coalition Against Domestic Violence, urged vigilance among marchers as an alleged sexual predator takes the oath of inauguration. Trump’s nominee for attorney general, Jeff Sessions, opposed the renewal and expansion of the Violence Against Women Act in 2012.
On average, 15 Connecticut women a year are killed by a partner, Gilchrest said. Most of them are pregnant and/or have a child in the house when the killing takes place.
“It really is going to take all of us,” she said, emotion catching in her throat as she spoke. “This is a man who uses his power, his influence and his wealth — he said it and you all heard it — to sexually violate women. And this man was elected president.”
“Now people are telling us to come together, forgive him, give him a chance,” she added. “Well, this Saturday, we will come together. But we won’t come together to accept Donald Trump. We come together to stand together for the country we want for ourselves, for the country and for our children. We come together to stand for immigrants. We come together to stand for black lives. We come together to stand for the environment. We come together to stand for gun sense. We stand together for women’s equality.”