The Koch Conspiracy To Cut Off Millions Of Americans’ Access To Healthcare

It’s Medicaid’s 50th birthday, and the Koch brothers planned something special: a death panel.

In conjunction with the 50th anniversary of Medicaid, Bridge Project today released a new report, “The Koch-Backed Effort to Kill Medicaid,” highlighting the Koch brothers ongoing assault on Medicaid, which they would give just about anything — hundreds of millions of dollars, anyway — to destroy.

And unlike some of their other, more subversive campaigns of destruction that prioritize their profit margins over the interests of the American public, the Kochs haven’t been too subtle on this one: the Kochs and Koch-funded groups have explicitly spoken out against Medicaid, advocated Medicaid-crippling budgets, and even attacked Republicans (!) for not supporting their Medicaid-destroying agenda.

This time, the Kochs are all-in. All-in to block state-level Medicaid expansions that would extend healthcare access to millions of Americans. All-in to strip healthcare from the millions who already benefit from the program […]

Read more after the jump.

WATCH: Planned Parenthood’s Attackers — In Their Own Words

Who’s attacking Planned Parenthood?

Radical, anti-choice extremists, who actively seek to restrict women in their health care options. Their extremist rhetoric speaks volumes. And yesterday, at anti-Planned Parenthood protests across the country, they spoke loud and clear.

Bridge Project today released a video, “This is Who’s Targeting Planned Parenthood,” exposing these anti-choice extremists for what they truly are.

Here they are, in their own words:

Read more after the jump.

WATCH: New Planned Parenthood Video

Bridge Project today is releasing a web ad that pulls the curtain open on anti-choice extremist group Center for Medical Progress and their highly edited and misleading attacks on Planned Parenthood. Center for Medical Progress activists have deep and lasting ties to militant extremists who have attacked Planned Parenthood and women’s healthcare for decades.

It is an attack coordinated with Republicans who have admitted viewing a video weeks earlier than its public release and comes from a group that reportedly has misled the IRS. Even Republican presidential candidates like Marco Rubio and Scott Walker are using these misleading attacks to fundraise.

David Daleiden & The Center For Medical Progress

David Daleiden Was A Friend Of James O’Keefe Of Veritas Visuals. According to the Claremont Conservative, “James O’Keefe is a friend of David Daleiden”s (sic) (CMC’11). O’Keefe and Hannah Giles have been going coast to coast documenting instances of ACORN employees willingly giving advice on how […]

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MEMO: Sunny California, Dark Money: Walker, Cruz, Huckabee Cozy Up To Kochs, ALEC

TO: Interested Parties
FROM: Eddie Vale
RE: Sunny California, Dark Money: Walker, Cruz, Huckabee Cozy Up To Kochs, ALEC
DATE: July 22nd, 2015

After last weekend’s Trumped-up circus in Iowa, Scott Walker, Mike Huckabee, and Ted Cruz are taking the Republican cattle call circuit behind closed doors in sunny San Diego, California.  Unfortunately for the middle class, this isn’t your ordinary speech-a-thon:  it’s the American Legislative Exchange Council, a Koch-powered bill mill where corporate interests meet policymakers in secret to find ways to warp the public interest in favor of bigger profits.

The Kochs have been involved in ALEC for “decades” and donated an “untold amount” of money along with chairing the board.  After years of building influence and padding their bottom line, ALEC is reaping the benefits of being part of the Koch primary and hosting Scott Walker, Ted Cruz, and Mike Huckabee this week as they seek to boost […]

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You’re only as good as the company you keep…

House and Senate Republicans are excited to be able to attack a woman’s right to choose and birth control again now that they think they got that whole pesky “legitimate rape” thing out of the way.

But as the ghost of Todd Akin still roams the hill they are aligning themselves with a whole new group of extremists – including those who condone violence against doctors and clinics – that are also supporting the political hit job on Planned Parenthood.

As Congress continues down this extreme anti-choice path they are likely to be looking back at the further damage they have done to their standing with women and wish they had found a way to shut this whole thing down.

Politico — Republicans have sought to use the videos to revive the debate over abortion, which has been largely dormant since former Rep. Todd Akin’s “legitimate rape” comments derailed his 2012 bid for […]

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Koch-Backed Concerned Veterans of America Launches Attacks Against Rep. Tim Walz

The shady group called Concerned Veterans of America is launching a six figure attack ad campaign against three Members of Congress including Representative Tim Walz (MN). But who is CVA and what do they stand for?

Enter Bridge Project and VoteVets.org, who have teamed up to expose the political agenda of Concerned Veterans of America with the recently released report titled, “The Vets Group That Fights Against Veterans.”

CVA promotes extreme right-wing policies that stand in opposition to nearly every other veterans group, as reported in the Military Times.

From pushing a plan to privatize the VA healthcare system to proposing a transition from the current military retirement system to a private 401(k)-like plan, CVA follows the radical conservatism of the Koch brothers, working to advance the billionaires’ self-interest at the expense of veterans.

​Bridge Project will be working with partners to hold CVA and the Koch brothers accountable as they plan to spend millions propping up GOP candidates and trying to buy elections.

Read about CVA attacking Rep. Walz here:

 

Read more after the jump.

New Research Shows Anti-Choice Group’s Extremist Ties and Potentially Illegal Activity

In light of today’s newly-released video from the extremist Center for Medical Progress attacking Planned Parenthood, here’s what new research reveals about the group with a history of subversive activities: They have ties to anti-choice extremism — including to groups that supported health worker harassment and that were sympathetic to a doctor’s killer — and allegedly performed other illegal activity.

The Center For Medical Progress — as innocently-named, as it is maliciously motivated — is, as The Huffington Post reported:

“[N]othing more than a front organization for the anti-abortion group Live Action. That is not how the IRS understood it when considering the group’s application for tax-exempt status, and not how the group originally presented itself to the public in soliciting donations.” 

That’s right: Center for Medical Progress seemingly misrepresented itself to the IRS as a biomedicine charity, whereas it is nothing more than a bona fide, anti-choice hit squad that, as The Huffington Post’s Laura Bassett put it, “appears […]

Read more after the jump.

Things Rep. Chris Smith Wants To Investigate: Birth Control

As Rep. Chris Smith uses a deceptively edited and misleading video to call for an investigation into Planned Parenthood, his charade is the latest in his history of calling for absurd investigations. Smith once called for an investigation into birth control pills.

Smith and other Republicans refuse to acknowledge medical study after medical study that show their claims about contraceptives are unfounded. It hasn’t stopped the GOP — including Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and Scott Walker — from lining up to attack Planned Parenthood for political expediency.

Background:

1998: Congressman Chris Smith Called For Using Resources At Congress’s Disposal To Come To A Conclusion How Birth Control “Chemicals” And The IUD Work, Out Of Concern They Might Cause Abortions. In a debate over the coverage of abortion and contraception in health care for federal employees, Chris Smith said, “Let me make it very clear there has to be a determination made, and maybe it is about […]

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REPORT: The Vets Group That Fights Against Veterans

Bridge Project and VoteVets.org have teamed up to expose the political agenda of Concerned Veterans of America in a new report titled, “The Vets Group That Fights Against Veterans.” CVA promotes extreme right-wing policies that stand in opposition to nearly every other veterans group, as reported in the Military Times today.

From pushing a plan to privatize the VA healthcare system to proposing a transition from the current military retirement system to a private 401(k)-like plan, CVA follows the radical conservatism of the Koch brothers, working to advance the billionaires’ self-interest at the expense of veterans.


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Already, Marco Rubio has participated in a CVA town hall in New Hampshire. Bridge Project will be working with partners to hold CVA and the Koch brothers accountable as Jeb Bush, Rubio, Scott Walker, and the rest of the Republican field audition for a slice of the $900 million the Kochs plan to spend propping up GOP candidates and trying to buy the White House.

Read “The Vets Group That […]

Read more after the jump.

Bridge Project Digital Ads Targeting NCLR Conference Reveal Truth Of Koch-Backed LIBRE Initiative

Bridge Project today announced it is running digital ads targeting attendees of the National Council of La Raza’s Annual Conference in Kansas City, Missouri, highlighting the truth behind the subversive motives of the Koch-funded LIBRE Initiative — a Koch brothers Latino-outreach front group, whose political motivations run counter to those of the Hispanic community.

One of the ads will target the group’s executive director, Daniel Garza, whose past comments reveal the LIBRE Initiative’s true agenda. Garza has expressed outrage over DACA, the executive order protecting DREAMers, denouncing it as “pandering” and “dangerous,” and called DAPA — which would extend those protections to members of DREAMers’ families — “executive overreach.” A second ad will highlight a LIBRE Initiative spokesperson’s unabashedly offensive characterization of undocumented immigrants as “illegals.”

The truth is LIBRE Initiative’s sole mission is to promote the Koch agenda above all else — and it shamelessly does so at the expense of Hispanics, by actively campaigning […]

Read more after the jump.