Bill Cassidy Picked a Side. It Wasn’t Ours.
Louisiana’s senior senator sided with billionaires over the sick, the poor, and the people who sent him to Washington. And, is a Louisiana death row inmate innocent?
U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy had a decision to make. He could stand with the people of Louisiana—working people, retired folks on fixed incomes, and parents working hard to keep their kids insured. Or he could side with the billionaires and Donald Trump.
He chose the billionaires and Trump.
With his vote Tuesday for the grotesque and falsely labeled “One Big Beautiful Bill,” Cassidy made clear he does not represent Louisiana, a state with struggling rural hospitals and people who rely on Medicaid to stay alive.
The New York Times summed it up nicely: “Millions of low-income Americans could experience staggering financial losses under the domestic policy package that Republicans advanced through the Senate on Tuesday, which reserves its greatest benefits for the rich while threatening to strip health insurance, food stamps and other aid from the poor.”
That’s the bill Cassidy and Sen. John Kennedy supported with their votes. And those are the votes that make it clear they represent Trump. They represent power. They represent billionaires.
They backed a bill that would impose deep, painful cuts to Medicaid. A bill that would take money from our clinics, rural hospitals, and caregivers to pay for tax breaks for the rich (while adding almost $4 trillion to the national debt). A bill that would gut funding for people with disabilities, for kids with asthma, and moms with cancer, and calls it “reform.”
Honestly, who thought for a moment Kennedy might do the right and honorable thing? He’s too busy preening for Fox News, hoping to catch Trump’s eye and snag a State Dinner invite.
But Cassidy? Some of my friends still believe that, unlike Kennedy, he has a conscience. They still seem to think that Cassidy knows that slashing Medicaid would be a nightmare for poor working families in Louisiana.
Well, of course, Cassidy knows.
He understands the heinous, immoral deal he made. He’s not ignorant. Before he sold his soul to MAGA, he was a physician who founded a clinic for the uninsured in Baton Rouge. He’s seen what poverty looks like up close. He’s watched patients stretch insulin and show up with infections they waited too long to treat.
Cassidy knows Medicaid is the difference between life and death for hundreds of thousands of people in Louisiana.
He knows. But does he care?
When Cassidy voted to deprive people of their healthcare to fund tax cuts for billionaires, it wasn’t just a political betrayal; it was a profound moral failure.
Louisiana is one of the sickest, poorest states in the country. We’ve got some of the highest rates of diabetes, heart disease, and maternal mortality in the U.S.
We need more healthcare, not less.
But instead of fighting for us, Cassidy voted to close hospitals in rural parishes and leave families with nowhere to turn when they need healthcare the most.
And he did it all to stay in good standing with Trump, because he has a reelection campaign to think about next year.
He saw how Trump attacked Thom Tillis after the North Carolina Republican criticized the bill. Trump threatened to primary Tillis. So, possessing far more decency than Cassidy, Tillis bowed out of his reelection campaign and voted against the bill.
In a Senate speech, Tillis said what Cassidy knows to be true but cannot acknowledge: “It is inescapable that this bill in its current form will betray the very promise that Donald J. Trump made in the Oval Office or in the Cabinet room when I was there with [Senate Finance Committee members].” That promise was that he would not support a cut to Medicaid.
Cassidy’s vote wasn’t about policy or the result of ignorance. It was about fear. Fear of losing power. Fear of crossing the man who still rules the GOP base.
Cassidy will come home and talk about “difficult decisions,” but cutting care for the poor while handing more tax breaks to billionaires isn’t a difficult call. It’s a cruel and gutless one.
This isn’t about partisan politics. It’s about whether we will protect the weak or exploit them, and whether we will let the love of power outweigh the power of love. (Hat tip: Jimi Hendrix)
On Tuesday, Bill Cassidy told us who he works for. And it’s not you and me.
One day, he’ll answer to more than just the people of Louisiana. He’ll answer to history—and maybe his maker.
As Hubert Humphrey once said: “The moral test of government is how it treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; the twilight of life, the elderly; and the shadows of life, the sick, the needy, and the handicapped.”
Cassidy, Kennedy, and other Senate Republicans failed that moral test on Tuesday. (The rest of our GOP House delegation already failed last month and are poised to fail again, maybe as early as Wednesday or Thursday.)
Dr. Bill Cassidy failed the moral test with eyes wide open. He knew better, but he lacked the courage to do what was right.
And Louisiana’s most vulnerable will pay the awful, deadly price.
Should Jimmie Christian Duncan be on Louisiana’s death row?
I’ve written before about the racism and injustice inherent in the death penalty. I’ve described it, especially in Louisiana, as “a killing machine fueled by racism.”
But it’s also a deeply flawed system that sends a significant number of people to death row who are later exonerated. Louisiana ranks fourth among the states—behind only Florida, Illinois, and Texas (much larger states)—in the number of people sentenced to death since 1972 who were released because evidence emerged that they were not guilty.
I want to suggest you read a series of posts by William Kissinger, a writer, Vietnam veteran, and ex-convict who spent 47 years in a Louisiana prison and now, out of prison, devotes his efforts to educating people about the injustice of the death penalty.
In a three-part series, Kissinger writes about the case of Jimmie Christian Duncan. He makes a compelling case for Duncan’s innocence. And he certainly demonstrates how Duncan was railroaded by “expert” witnesses whose expertise may have been in providing the prosecution with the kind of evidence and testimony it needed, regardless of the facts.
Kissinger writes:
Jimmie Duncan is on death row in Louisiana for a crime that many experts - and also quite ordinary people as well - say may never have even happened. He has been there for almost 32 years. I know him well. In fact, I used to sell him tacos, burritos, and cheeseburgers from the inmate club I was the founding president of, the Camp F VETS. I used to stop and talk to him if he was awake in the mornings when I picked up deli orders, or in the evenings when I delivered food, or on Tuesdays when I delivered fruit for indigent prisoners.
His case has become a gathering spot for wrongful conviction advocates primarily because of its connection to two of the most well-known names in forensic misconduct: Michael West and Steven Hayne. These discredited forensic figures have been linked to many wrongful convictions, many of which have been overturned, and of the overturned, 4 are death row veterans. Yet, in spite of mounting evidence that Duncan was convicted based on junk science, Louisiana continued to push onward with the tortuous path towards his execution.
Read part 1 at this link.
Read part 2 at this link.
Read part 3 at this link.
I absolutely agree with you. I once thought Cassidy had compassion and morals. (I knew Kennedy didn’t). Now I know Cassidy is only concerned for his political future which is being a MAGA lackey marching us to the destruction of our democracy.
My heart is broken and my disappointment is large. Why did I think the will of the people, clearly stated, would be heard by our Senators, and other ones who represent states with a large population of poor constituants, and middle class ones as well. They ( and me) will suffer unless the House comes through. To you spineless, selfish Senators, hang your big heads in shame, and be prepared to lose when your term comes up. Supporting a fascist president is not who we voted for.