Bryson Leads GOP Effort to Kill Cover Tennessee
GOP gubernatorial candidate Jim Bryson led an effort in the state Senate to kill Governor Phil Bredesen’s plan to provide affordable, portable health insurance to working Tennesseans. Bryson, a first-term legislator who’s stepping down from the Senate to run for governor, filed an amendment to Bredesen’s Cover Tennessee initiative that would prohibit the State from assuming any financial risk in the plan — a move that Bredesen Administration officials said would effectively kill the program. According to the Knoxville News-Sentinel, the Republican-controlled Senate voted 17-14 along party lines on Monday in favor of Bryson’s amendment to kill Cover Tennessee. Bredesen Finance Commissioner Dave Goetz called the vote “unconscionable,” adding that he’s hopeful Bryson’s poison-pill provision will get stripped off when the Cover Tennessee bill goes to a House-Senate conference committee to resolve differences.
Earlier Monday, Bryson filed another poison-pill amendment, this one to add medical malpractice reform provisions to the bill. Tennessee Democratic Party Chairman Bob Tuke immediately attacked Bryson’s blatantly political move. “It’s absolutely no coincidence that Senator Bryson filed this amendment on the day the legislative fundraising blackout lifted,” he said. “He’s choosing wealthy doctors over the 600,000 working Tennesseans who need access to affordable health insurance. It’s the worst case of political pandering to special interests that we’ve seen in a long time.”
