During a stop in Montrose during the August recess, Senator Michael Bennet sat down with KVNF in Studio M to share his views on major issues affecting Western Colorado — from rural health care and immigration to water rights, wolf reintroduction, and why he’s running for governor.
Bennet said the visit was part of a larger swing through the Western Slope. “We’re having an incredible trip today,” he said. “I was over in the Gunnison Gorge where we were looking at the jet boats that are there that are being preserved as part of the proposed Corp Act, a public lands bill that I introduced with the leadership of Delta County and Gunnison County, who have been working in this incredible partnership to preserve that very special public amenity.”
Rural Healthcare
One of the most pressing concerns for many rural voters is access to health care. Bennet acknowledged it’s a statewide — and nationwide — crisis. “Even though we live in the richest country in the world we have a healthcare system that cost twice as much as any industrialized countries healthcare and we don’t cover everybody,” he said. “People don’t have a reasonable expectation in many places that they’re going to have primary care just to [get a] check up from a doctor.”
In rural areas like Montrose County, he said, “people in this valley and valleys just like this all over the state… feel like they have no chance of ever ... getting the mental health care that they need or that their children need.”
Bennet warned that recent federal legislation could worsen the problem. “A lot of those people are going to be thrown off Medicaid as a result of this legislation that President Trump just passed,” he said. “They are now going to be uninsured and they are going to go to the emergency room to get healthcare coverage, as everybody in America would if it’s not their fault that they’ve been uninsured.”
That shift, he said, will be expensive for everyone. “That’s the most expensive place they are going to go. And what it’s going to mean is it’s going to Jack up the insurance rates for everybody else because now we’re all going to be paying for a group of people that were covered by Medicaid, but now were uninsured. And so now their sick, and that's where they're going to go.”
He added, “It’s hard for me to imagine why the current administration would want to actually make our healthcare system even more challenging for rural America than it already is. But that is exactly what they’ve done.”
Bennet said he has long supported the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid, but sees the current system as deeply flawed. “In defending it, I’m also defending, what really is, the worst healthcare system in the industrialized world,” he said.
What’s needed, he said, is “a healthcare system in this country that cost half the cost of what it cost us now and provides much better care.”
That includes more access to primary and mental health care. “Primary care is just a fancy way of saying going to the doctor, which is really important for people to be able to do because that’s how you stay healthy and that’s how you cost the system less.”
He argued the solution is a universal health care system that still preserves choice. “I believe that this country needs to work toward having a universal healthcare system where everybody is covered, where we drive prices down, where we’re not gouged by drug companies and where we’re not gouged by medical device manufacturers, where we’re not gouged by insurance companies.”
For Bennet, that includes giving people a public option — something he’s supported for years. “I introduced a bill probably a decade ago called Medicare X that we give everybody in America the chance to be, have a public option if they wanted to, to opt out of the private insurance market.”
He emphasized, “We have 330 million Americans in this country… that’s more than enough to run a system where you have the choice of private insurance if that’s what you want. But you should also have the choice of a public option if that’s what you want.”
He added, “I actually think we should start at the other end. We should be saying to people that are coming off their parents insurance, that are in their mid 20s, who are starting businesses, who are raising families, who are trying to buy a house. They ought to have the first option to be on a public option in this country.”
Immigration
Shifting to immigration, Bennet recalled working on bipartisan reform a decade ago. “I was one of the four Democrats. It was called the Gang of 8. John McCain was the leader of the Republicans,” he said. “We passed that vote with 68 votes in the US Senate.”
The bill included a pathway to citizenship for 11 million undocumented immigrants, the DREAM Act, visa reforms for agriculture and tourism, and significant border security investments. “We had $46 billion for border security. And, and because we do need a secure border, we have to manage the border of the United States.”
Though that effort ultimately died in the House, Bennet said he believes “when we pass a comprehensive Immigration Bill again in America, it will have those 4 principles again in it.”
He also noted the real-world impact of immigration policy on families and children. “I used to be the Superintendent of the Denver Public Schools,” he said. “Many of the kids in that school district… are immigrants whose families are immigrants. And I know how damaging chaos at the border is for them.”
Wolves
On Colorado’s controversial wolf reintroduction plan, Bennet said he understands the frustration from ranchers. “I can see why people feel that way,” he said. “There was a lot of hard work put in the Wolf Management plan… I think that we’re not fulfilling what that plan says we should be doing.”
He continued, “We should listen to the voices of the producers who are being affected by our failure to live up to the management plan and take their voices into account because I don’t think, I think frankly, that’s the only way it’s going to be successful.”
West Slope Water
On water, Bennet expressed support for the proposed purchase of the Shoshone water rights by the Colorado River District. “I think it would be a very good deal for Colorado,” he said. “I have worked incredibly hard to get $50 million committed from the federal government to support that deal.”
That funding is part of a larger federal drought response package. “That money came out of a $4 billion a package that I put together for the states in the Colorado River Basin to be able to grapple with the incredible drought conditions that we are facing.”
Upper Basin vs Lower Basin
Looking ahead to the Colorado River’s future, Bennet said, “Colorado producers have given and given and given just because of the nature of the hydrology and because of where we are in the in the basin.”
He added, “It would be much better for the upper basin and lower basin and for the states to be able to come together in agreement than having the federal government cram something down on all of us.”
Why run for Governor?
Asked why he’s leaving the U.S. Senate to run for governor, Bennet said, “This is a moment when our country needs every single one of us to search our moral conscience and decide where can we make a difference.”
He added, “We need to have an affirmative, compelling vision of what the future looks like,” and said he hopes to improve affordability in the state ensuring that “there are people all over the state who are now saying, you know what? Now I know I’m going to be able to die happy because my kid, my grandchild is going to be able to live in the state that I love.”
