Sen. Murray Discusses GOP Attacks on Abortion & Access to Health Care, Efforts to Reverse Cuts

Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and a senior member and former chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, held a roundtable discussion with patient advocates and health care providers from Washington state and Idaho to discuss how recent moves by President Trump and Republicans in Congress to attack access to health care—especially reproductive health care—and slash Medicaid are harming people in Washington state and across the entire Pacific Northwest.

Joining Senator Murray for the event were; Rebecca Gibron, CEO, Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawaiʻi, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky; Dr. Keemi Ereme, OB/GYN at UW Medicine and Assistant Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology; Dr. Caitlin Gustafson, family physician from rural Idaho and co-president of the Idaho Coalition for Safe Healthcare; Kayla Smith, a patient storyteller who traveled to Washington from Idaho for necessary abortion care and former plaintiff in Adkins v. State of Idaho; Emily Cuarenta, a patient storyteller and student at Eastern Washington University; and Heather Mullin, a patient storyteller and local advocate from the Seattle area.