Students Lead a Sit-In at Sen. Lieberman’s DC Office. 9 Arrests

Jason Ortiz (860 639 8101) reports the following:

Click here to watch raw footage of sit-in this morning.

At roughly 10:15am, nine students, along with other protesters, including some seniors, were arrested for staging a sit-in at Senator Lieberman’s Washington DC office.  The protesters were seeking a meeting with Senator Lieberman to demand he return his campaign contributions he received from AETNA health before making a pledge to filibuster the Senate healthcare bill.   Two of the nine arrested are Connecticut citizens, one is an UConn student; Brittany Florio, the other is an UConn alumni John Mohrbacher.

Protesters entered Lieberman’s office at approximately 9:45am this morning and demanded to speak with their Senator, which was promptly denied on the grounds that he was not available. They told Lieberman’s staff that they would be remaining in the office until Senator Lieberman returned.  The response was if they did not leave, Senator Lieberman’s staff would call the police, which they did.

As expected the police came and forcibly removed the protesters by as they chanted there demands, “Represent Connecticut not Aetna!” and “Insurance corruption money makes me sick!” The protesters stated that they are fed up with elected officials being openly in the hands of corporate interests and refused to allow Lieberman to sell out Connecticut citizens without a fight.

The students involved today have organized many events in Connecticut to support health care reform, including a rally held on the UConn campus this past Wednesday.

This action is part of a national mobilization for universal health care called, “Mobilization for Healthcare for All.” Thus far, there have been 141 arrests made throughout the country in 24 cities, including 4 doctors.

Since 1989, Senator Lieberman ranks in the top 10 of US Senators who have accepted large donations from the health care industry, with a total of $2.3 million since 1989 (see full report).

Specifically,  Senator Lieberman has accepted over $110,000 in campaign contributions from Connecticut-based AETNA health.  Aetna has spent over $2 million in lobbying and contributions to derail health reform while profiting by denying sick people the care they need to live. Senator Lieberman recently threatened to join the republican filibuster and hold the fate of health reform in his hands. He is choosing to represent the health industry instead of representing the people of Connecticut; the reason Connecticut citizens  elected him.

1 Comment(s)

Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI