From the Marietta Ohio 9.12 Project --
REPRESENTATIVE-ELECT BILL JOHNSON DECLINES CONGRESSIONAL HEALTH CARE BENEFITS
Says Congress should focus on patient-based, market-driven solutions.
Bill Johnson is a Congressional Candidate that the Marietta OH 9-12 Project and many other TEA Parties in the Ohio 6th District worked to elect last month. He is demonstrating the kind of character that TEA Party Candidates are bringing to Washington. We can only hope that others in Congress follow his lead.
Poland, OH -- Representative-elect Bill Johnson has announced his decision to turn down Congressional health care benefits as he enters the House of Representatives.
The decision, Johnson says, is based on his belief that members of Congress shouldn't have access to premium health care benefits when millions of Americans are struggling just to make ends meet.
"Lincoln famously put forth the notion that government should be of the people, by the people and for the people," Johnson said. "This is one substantial way I can show that my commitment to the people of Eastern and Southern Ohio is to help them, not to gain exclusive benefits for myself."
Johnson said Congress must focus on repealing Obama Health Care and instead adopt patient-based, market-driven health care solutions.
"I oppose ObamaCare because government-controlled health care will create more debt and huge bureaucracy," Johnson said. "We need to reverse the government takeover of our health care, and we should adopt common sense, patient-centered, private sector solutions like making health care portable from job to job and state to state, tort reform, and promoting health savings accounts."
In addition to declining Congressional health care, Representative-elect Johnson will turn down the government 401K program and the associated matching portion that is paid for by taxpayers.
Bill Johnson will represent Ohio's Sixth Congressional District, which includes all or parts of 12 counties along the Ohio River in Eastern and Southern Ohio. He lives in Poland with his wife LeeAnn and son Nathan.
