MTV News
By Ana Marie Cox
The U.S. Conference of Mayors has Republican mayors, but you all came together on these issues. Mayors see these stories that you’re talking about, even if they’re conservative or Republican mayors, and they see the same things that you do.
Walsh: It’s our responsibility. I said last night too at the meeting that I am the mayor of Boston, I am a Democrat. But, I am not the mayor of Democratic people in Boston. I am the mayor of Democrats and Republicans, Independents, Tea Party, and the unenrolled. I am the mayor of conservatives and progressives. I am the mayor of all the different races. I am the mayor of the rich and the poor. As a mayor, I don’t make my decisions based upon whether it is a “Democrat” issue. You make your decisions based upon the people you represent as a city to move our city forward. There’s probably never been a more important time for mayors in America than there is right now in this country, because the people who are being targeted, and the fear that’s happening out there, those people live in our cities.
Do you have any other things you’re worried about? Or things beyond the immigration issue that you feel like, as mayor, you’re going to step up on?
Walsh: The Affordable Care Act is a huge problem. [Repealing the ACA is] going to have huge implications. We have millennials that live in our city that are on their parents’ health insurance. The businesses have hired them and have been able to hire more people because they have been able to be on their own health insurance. We have seniors in our city who have preexisting conditions, or something called a “donut hole,” which is a prescription drug [gap] in Medicare. Whatever changes they make could have detrimental effects on people’s health care, but also on the economy. We’re very involved and concerned about that.
It’s the cities that are going to have to pick up the slack if the ACA goes away and people start using emergency rooms as their primary care.
Walsh: Yeah, we will go back to a big problem. It will affect the state budget in the $1 billion [range]. It will affect the city budget in the tens of millions if not hundreds of millions. There are implications that run deep. Boston’s just one piece of it.
If you go around the country and you talk to mayors with community hospitals in their neighborhoods, they’re going to say, “Wait a second, the community hospital has not only gotten stronger in our neighborhood [because of the ACA], but it’s an economic engine in our community whereby people get employed and helped, not just get treated both for a condition or preventative care.” There’s a lot more to it.