(Washington, D.C.) – The following is an official statement by Teamsters General President James P. Hoffa:

“In July, I co-wrote a letter to Sen. Harry Reid and Rep. Nancy Pelosi expressing our concerns about specific provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the potential unintended consequences of those provisions. The concerns outlined in that letter have been taken out of context by anti-worker legislators and political organizations in an attempt to bolster their own arguments against the ACA. They are further trying to show that there is some broad movement to derail the ACA from all sides of the political spectrum.

“Though we may have concerns with specific provisions of the ACA, we share the president’s goal of ensuring that every American has affordable access to top-quality health care. It is on this main point that we disagree wholeheartedly with the efforts of extreme right-wing Republicans to gut the ACA. Any suggestion otherwise is simply political posturing.

“I call on Sen. Ted Cruz, Sen. David Vitter and others to cease and desist from misusing our constructive comments in their destructive campaign to hobble the president and the nation.

“Working Americans are fed up with the continued cycle of holding the government and the economy hostage to achieve some empty political victory. Working families are the only people hurt by Republican maneuverings to shut down the government and play Russian roulette with the debt ceiling.”

• Share on Facebook
• Share on Twitter
• Share via email