UFT Prez: ‘We’re Gonna Try to Strategize to Fight Against the [Healthcare] Industry’

By Bob Hennelly with Joe Maniscalco

Despite increasing opposition — a lot of it coming from his sisters and brothers in organized labor, UFT President Michael Mulgrew continues to push hard for a shift to a Medicare Advantage Plan for New York City municipal retirees. And on this week’s edition of the Stuck Nation Radio Labor Hour, the UFT leader suggests changing the administrative code and ushering in MAP will give New York City the ability to tame the for-profit private health insurance industry.

“We at least have an agreement here with the city administration that we’re gonna try to do it differently,” Mulgrew says. “We’re not gonna fight with each other over the costs — we’re gonna try to strategize to fight against the industry.”

UFT President Michael Mulgrew.

We also talk with Elena Lavarrada, Deputy Political Director of 32 BJ SEIU and Maura Colloingsgru, NJ Citizen Action’s director of advocacy. They are part of  a broad coalition of grass roots New Jersey labor, immigrant rights and environmental groups, representing tens of thousands of members that are canvasing throughout New Jersey on behalf of incumbent progressives in Congress Rep. Tom Malinowski (7CD), Rep. Andy Kim (3CD), Rep. Mike Sherrill (11CD).

The independent coalition includes  New Jersey Working Families Party, SEIU 32BJ, NJ Citizen Action, Make the Road Action, CWA,  Latina Civic, Blue Wave, and Clean Water Action.

After that, we welcome Bruce Lesley, the executive director of First Focus on Children, a national non-profit that focuses on gaps in America’s social safety net for the millions of the most vulnerable segment of our population. Lesley goes into depth about the generational consequences of Congress’s failure to reauthorize the Expanded Child Tax Credit or to deliver on childcare for families hit hard by the fallout from the pandemic.

Listen to it all below: