Interview with State Senator Kelda Roys for Governor

Transcript

Chris: 0:36

Welcome to pulse check, Wisconsin.

0:55

good morning, good evening, good afternoon. Welcome back to post Check Wisconsin, where we break down the politics of public health, healthcare access, and the policy shaping our everyday lives. Today we are digging into one of the most defining issues of our time healthcare here in the state of Wisconsin women's reproductive freedoms, the cost of care for working families, and the future leadership of our state. And joining us here today is someone at the center of it all. We have State Senator Kelda Roys Who is also candidate for the governor State of Wisconsin? Senator Roys is a lifetime advocate for reproductive rights, a former assembly member, a small business owner. She's a mom as well, and someone who has been deeply vocal about the real world consequences of our healthcare here in the state of Wisconsin. So with that being said. Senator Royce, thank you so much for joining us here today on post Check Wisconsin. I'm happy to be with you, Chris. Thanks for having me. Absolutely. So for folks who may only know your name from the headlines, how do you introduce yourself and the work that you're doing right now in the state of Wisconsin? I'm a mom from Medford working to make Wisconsin a place where everyone, no matter who you are or where you're from, has the freedom to thrive. I've done that in the state senate. I've done that as a healthcare advocate, as an attorney and small business owner, and most of all, just. As a Wisconsinite, who cares about making a better world? Absolutely. And that's so important now, especially, the times that we're in right now, it seems like there's huge divides both here in the state as well as federally. And so people want to hear that. People want to know, you know, who you are as a person and you know what you're fighting for, but as you run for governor just looking across. Healthcare, looking across the lines of reproductive freedoms and the cost of care in our state, what to you feels most urgent in this moment? Well, I would say two things. Number one, we are about to see the collapse of healthcare, particularly in rural areas across the state. We have about 270,000 wisconsinites that are projected to lose access to health insurance over the next couple of years, and that's an urgent problem, even if for people who are lucky enough to have private insurance, because it's gonna force the closure. Of many rural hospitals and clinics, the loss of providers, and it's gonna cause everyone else's insurance premiums to skyrocket. So expanding coverage and access to health insurance that's affordable and high quality is one of my number one priorities as governor. The other thing are the tremendous threats to reproductive freedom at both the state and federal levels. We have right wing ideologues who are just hellbent on imposing their narrow worldview on the rest of us. They wanna have a complete abortion ban. The Republican nominee for governor, likely nominee Tom Tiffany voted for a federal abortion ban that has no exceptions of bans. Virtually all abortions nationwide. This could be a huge emergency for the country. Yeah. And you know, we, we've talked about that on multiple episodes here. You know, you've seen the headlines across the state and even yourself personally. I've seen headlines from you seen videos. For you, you've been very open about your own personal experiences as a patient and as a mom and as someone who has suffered a miscarriage before in the past. And you know, only if you're comfortable, can you take us back to that time, what was happening, for yourself as a patient and what did supportive care look like for you in that moment? Well, my husband and I were excited to try, um, to have a baby. And I, I have two stepdaughters who are wonderful, but we were ready to, um, have another baby or have a little baby, and, uh, was so excited to be pregnant. And about eight or nine weeks in, we went for an ultrasound and the nurse midwife basically said, looks like you're. Gonna be heading for a miscarriage because we don't see the activity that we would normally expect. And, and sure enough, a couple days later I started to miscarry and I did not realize how physically painful it would be. And it was a process that takes a couple of days and, uh, you know, it's, I didn't really realize until after it happened to me and I started talking to friends how common it's, it's just not something that we talk about in this country. We don't, we don't tend to talk really about pregnancy. We don't talk about reproductive health and you know, just like you don't talk about religion and money, right? We're Midwesterners and, but to realize how many of my friends had experienced miscarriage, how common this is, and how many people require medical intervention to complete their miscarriage safely so that they can, you know, stay alive and then hopefully go on to have another baby. As I was lucky enough to be able to go on and have my three beautiful children. And, you know, you brought up some good points there, uh, aside from your own personal take on it. I agree. We don't talk that much about complications of, of pregnancy because aside from all those things, there's also that emotional component of it too. You know, a lot of moms that have come into the emergency department, the first questions they ask me is, was this my fault? What could I have done to prevent this? And you know how common it is is something that we have to talk about. It's not your fault. This is something that happens unfortunately, commonly and in, in my estimation. That's something that a lot of, a lot of people will need in that situation, right? You need those clinicians to be there for you. When you think about some of the clinicians who cared for you in that time, in those moments, what stood out for you and what did you need from the healthcare system in that moment? Well, I needed compassionate support. As you just talked about, you know, you always wonder like, what could I have? You know, did I do something to make this happen? You know, should I not have ridden my bike or whatever? I mean, I think, you know, society is really primed to blame women for any outcome. You know, if a child grows up and they commit a crime, we say, well, probably because they had a bad mom or bad parents. Mm-hmm. As women, we are conditioned to take that responsibility onto ourselves. And you know, the truth is that we really don't know why so many pregnancies do end a miscarriage, but this is a part of life. And, you know, oftentimes the pregnancies that are ending may be unviable. Right? But in, in my case, it was early enough along that there was really no, you know, there was no indication, um, of, of anything. We didn't, you know, there was nothing to really investigate or figure out why, and so I just needed people who were gonna be compassionate as to the emotional loss that I was gonna experience and support me with the physical pain. Because it is a very isolating experience, and now you transpose that to today, right? When you see headlines almost daily, almost weekly, you know, when you see lawmakers attempting to regulate miscarriage care, to even redefine abortion or to criminalize actions made between patients and their physician, how does that land with you as someone who has lived it as well as a lawmaker? It makes me furious. It makes me furious. For women, you know, I experienced a late first trimester miscarriage, and I think about women who go to that 20 week ultrasound, they have painted the nursery. They are ready, you know, they, they're so excited to have their baby, and they go and they find out something is horribly wrong, and that they're not gonna have a, a, they're not gonna have the baby that they dreamed of, or that the woman's life is in jeopardy and abortion is the only way to protect her life and her health, and they're not allowed to get care here in Wisconsin. They have to travel out of state at great expense away from their family, their home, their loved ones, their support network to an unfamiliar provider in an unfamiliar location to receive abortion care. And that's, that was happening under Roe v. Wade. And that's continuing to happen now. And you know, to me that is such a dereliction of political duty. Politicians really have no business getting involved in people's personal medical decisions. We have our own life to live. We don't get to force our beliefs on somebody else. And I just, I fundamentally believe that to be a core principle, if you wanna live in a free society, you have to let people make decisions that might be different from the decisions that you would make. And that includes someone who is pregnant and doesn't wanna be, or isn't ready to be a parent. You know, everyone needs access to safe abortion care, but it's also the freedom to form a family, right? I've done a lot of work on fertility treatment and coverage. Um, a lot of work on helping women who get IUD insertions have options for pain relief right there. There's so many aspects of the system where we're just not meeting the reproductive health needs of, um, women and girls across the spectrum, and we really need to step up and do a better job. Absolutely. And even before, like you said, even before Roe v. Wade decision came out, even after we had, you know, the, the walking back of some of those restrictions, as an ER provider, I saw the results of many pregnant people who would come into the emergency department, who may have sought abortion care, overstate lines, or may have had a miscarriage. And they were scared, right? They were frightened. They didn't know what was going to happen to'em. They didn't know if there was gonna be legal repercussions because, you know. They went across the, the state line to Illinois. They went to Michigan or they went wherever. Right? And so there is still some of that doubt leaving to this day, right? Because a lot of people, there's so many headlines and there's so much that you hear about, Senate bills coming out that are restricting. Abortion access. Right. Or, or attempting to establish fetal personhood. For someone who is listening right now and who is going through a miscarriage, what messages do you want them to hear? How, how would you approach them? Well, I would say, first of all, I am so sorry for what you're experiencing. And know that you are absolutely not alone. This is something that so many of us go through and, um, you know, we're, I just wrap my arms around you and, and hope that you are assured that it is not your fault and that. You can go on to have healthy pregnancies and healthy babies, and you will get through this. Absolutely. Well, let's pivot right now. Let's talk about healthcare in general in the state of Wisconsin, because again, there's a lot of headlines about that as well. For the typical family in the state of Wisconsin, how would you describe the state of healthcare right now for them? Unaffordable, number one. It's really, really expensive, frustrating, you know, arguing with the insurance company about what they're gonna cover, trying to get an appointment. You often have to wait. A long time or drive long distances. And I would say that it's, you know, the system we have does not lead to great outcomes. You know, this state has pretty high infant and maternal mortality. For instance, we have really shameful racial disparities in a lot of our healthcare outcomes. And just in general, in the United States, we spend more per person on average than almost any other developed country. And yet our outcomes, our health outcomes are actually worse. We have shorter lifespans, so we're doing it wrong. And that's because our dollars are spent really inefficiently. And I think there is a better way. I strongly believe that healthcare should be a right, that all people have. It shouldn't be something that we're gonna ration based on the job that you have or how much money you have. And that's the system we have right now. Your healthcare is rationed based on your job and your wealth. Um, and to me, all of us are human beings living in bodies. We're all gonna need healthcare. It should be something that we. Share as a society, and I mean we, we've seen premiums, uh, go up. We've seen deductibles. Prescription costs are just through the roof right now, you know, and that's aside from childcare and housing as well. What do you see both here, you know, in the state of Wisconsin as well as federally? What do you see? As being the reason these costs are being driven up so, so much at this point? Well, part of it is the profit motive, right? We've decided that healthcare is going to be largely for profit in this country. So, um, insurance companies that are owned by, um, investors and hedge funds obviously wanna see those returns. And how do they get the returns? It's by taking your premiums and denying care. And, but the problem is like the money isn't actually going into provider's pockets. So providers are getting suites. I talk to physicians. Things, you know, who are, you know, should all be doing financially fine. And they're talking about how their economics have really become squeezed and they're not able to practice in the way that they want to. I talked to one doctor who said, uh, she used to do a procedure and she would get about$3,500 per procedure. And it's, it's short, it's, you know, 15 minutes. However, it's extremely high stakes. This is a procedure that if done incorrectly, could paralyze or kill the patient. And now she said. Um, she's, her rate for doing this is about$65 because of the way that the contracts that these for-profit payers have negotiated. So we've got huge problems in Wisconsin. We've got provider shortages. That's one reason that I championed the A PRN modernization bill to allow expanded practice by nurse practitioners for things like primary care where they just are not physicians in rural areas. And I think we've got so much further to go. Especially as we face this looming crisis of people losing their, their care and coverage. And, and I've developed a plan and I'd love to talk about it. Yeah. Well, let's, let's get into it because, you know, I am as much as a rural provider, as I am an urban provider too. And a lot of, whenever I go into the eds in these rural locations, a lot of the rural patients that I see, as well as some of the rural listeners to this show are watching their clinics and their OB units close. And you talked about the A PRM bill that is going to serve to kind of help, you know, some of those clinics they floating allow some of those resources to be available for those patients. But what steps should the next administration take to stabilize accessing going forward? Well, for a long time, Democrats have fought to expand. Badger Care expand Medicaid. Here in Wisconsin, we're one of the very few states that has not done it. And I'm very sorry to say that as a result of the big ugly bill, the federal budget that passed last summer, that option is now functionally off the table for Wisconsin until things change federally. And I know some of the other Democratic candidates are still touting this as their plan for healthcare. And I just think that's wholly inadequate because it's, it's just not feasible. And we shouldn't tell people that we're gonna do something that we really can't. Deliver on. So my plan for healthcare basically will expand the great nonprofit, uh, competitive low cost, high quality health insurance that I enjoy as a state employee, as as your state senator. And it will open it up to allow anyone to buy in. So if you're an individual and you wanna buy health insurance, you could go on the exchange or you. Buy into the state plan if that's better for you. And you could have an individual plan or a family plan. You can have a high deductible plan or a low deductible plan. I have three young kids at home, so, and I've got one young adult who's still on our healthcare plan. So I obviously have the low deductible plan'cause we use a lot of healthcare, right? And so these, these wonderful plans and they are non-profit payers. There isn't that profit motive, and they're more efficient. They spend more of the dollars that they collect on healthcare and fewer on administration and none on profit. And that kind of plan could really be transformative for the state. So if you're a small business owner, you could buy in for yourself or for your business. Say you own a big manufacturing company and you're tired of getting the 22% a year premium hikes from Aetna or Blue Cross Blue Shield, why not give. The state plans are, try and see those treatments go down to me that this is a way to expand people's freedom by decoupling their healthcare from their employer. It's voluntary, totally voluntary, right? So if you like what you're, what is happening now for healthcare, keep it. But the more people that we ensure in the state, the better it is for all of us. Number one, we're keeping people productive in the workforce. You know, people with chronic diseases are getting those diseases managed so they're able to live and thrive and be productive. We're lowering the cost of premiums for people because more people are in the pool, right? So people who would pay huge amounts if they were on the exchange and buying an individual plan are now part of a really big pool, so they don't have to take on that additional risk themselves. And we're lowering the cost for taxpayers too, because when we have more people who are insured and we're spreading the cost of our health insurance. Over more people than the, the basically cost per person. Down. Yeah. And, and you know, a lot of that too, you've heard it, you know, majority, like you said on the Democratic side of here, in the state of Wisconsin, people saying, you know, we need to expand this access to care. Um, and, and giving the, you know, potential downsides of not doing so. But we've seen, we are at a point in time here in our country, there's a political divide as big as the Grand Canyon right now. Right, right. How, how do you, in your first a hundred days, hope to serve in a way. How do you approach, working across the aisle in that respect to try to get to some, agreement, for the betterment of the people of the state of Wisconsin? Yeah, Chris, this is a big differentiator for me in my campaign because I actually have a really strong track record of working across the aisle on all kinds of issues that are important to people. I mean, as I said, I'm a mom from Medford. And my number one goal is to make Wisconsin a place where everyone has the freedom to thrive. Whether you're a Democrat or a Republican, whether you live in a rural community or an urban one, or whether you live in the suburbs, right, you deserve to have high quality public schools that will help your kids learn and grow. You deserve to have affordable, accessible childcare. And healthcare that that actually works for you and your family. So the nurse modernization bill that I referenced earlier, that was actually a Republican bill for years. I was the only Democrat on that bill because I thought it was the right thing to do. And actually our governor, Tony Evers, you know, who I greatly support and appreciate, he actually vetoed that bill several times. But finally we were able to build enough support on the democratic side of the aisle. And that bill became law after years of effort this fall. And you know, that's the kind of. Willingness to reach across the aisle and partner with people whom I might disagree with on a whole host of issues, but on one issue we agree and we can move forward. You know, I helped to make Wisconsin one of the first states to ban BPA in children's baby bottles and sippy cups. Again, working across the aisle, building bipartisan support. And I think those skills are really important for anyone. But definitely if you wanna be governor and definitely if you wanna be governor of a purple state, you gotta be able to deliver for people. Absolutely. What, what in your estimation, because again, it, is a great difference as you know, talking to people one-on-one and then talking to them after they've done an interview. But we've seen a lot of bills that have attempted, like you said, to, redefine abortion care, regulate miscarriage care to, to essentially hinder the expansion of some of these programs outside of just Badger Care expansion to provide healthcare. What do you think? You know, the, the, the hiccup has been. And what do you think some of the, these regulations and some of this, I guess more so deterrence to doing this, what do you think this is about? I think it's really about trying to control and shame women. The impulse to regulate abortion or regulate women's personal and private medical decisions is really, has nothing to do with, you know, being pro-life. Because the very same people that are pushing these bills are the ones who are creating more unintended pregnancies by refusing to support comprehensive sex ed. That's honest with young people. They refuse to support increased access to contraception, and in fact, some of them actually wanna ban birth control and they're attacking birth control at the federal and state levels. And it's certainly not about concern for babies because these are also people that oppose paid family and medical leave, which is a huge way that you can help reduce quality. Um, you know, I've, for years when I was the head of NAL Pro-Choice Wisconsin, I actually made reducing our infant mortality rates a key priority for nal. And I couldn't get a single Republican interested in these very low cost interventions that can dramatically improve survival for babies. And, and the Republicans were just not interested. Abortion bans are here for one reason, and they kill women. ProPublica has already announced that abortion bans, they have found seven instances that are verifiable. Where women would be alive today if that abortion ban had not been on the books. And I think about these women who, you know, many of them spent their final days on earth desperately knowing that they needed a, needed an abortion, desperately trying to find somebody who would provide it for them failing and then die. And that should never, never happen. But because politicians wanted to impose their radical right-wing views on us, those women are gone. It is a tragedy. And as like you said, you know, the, the, these are lives that we are playing around with here, right? To, to be honest with you, you know, these are deaths that don't need to occur. Now, I was talking to a friend the other day about some of the negative feedback that, that she was getting, and she was also a ER provider and I said, you know, if anything, we're putting ourselves out business, we want to advocate. For you not being in the emergency department. Right. And so, you know that, that you speak to that, that point in that, the, these are politicians playing politics, but the Wisconsin people are paying the price, the patients are paying the price. These families are paying a price, that is insurmountable, when you're talking about potentially dying from some of these complications. Right. And again, you know, for a provider, just think about what a horrible situation we're putting our, our physicians in. To basically not just risk your medical license or civil liability, like getting sued, but to risk prison time. Mm-hmm. You know, to risk being incarcerated because you didn't wait long enough for a woman to be close to death. And what makes me angry is how the anti-choice movement wants to blame physicians or blame pro-choice advocates for these women's deaths. That's actually part of their plan. You know, to say that basically we were being histor hysterical. And that of course doctors should step in and save their lives. But that's actually not how these laws are written. They are written specifically to put the fear of God into physicians. Mm-hmm. To not intervene. And as you know, pregnancy is, is dangerous, every pregnancy is different and things can be fine and go south in a heartbeat. And I want our physicians. To feel free to do what they need to do to take care of my health, and I wanna be the one in charge. Of what happens with me and my family, not politicians in the capitol somewhere. Absolutely. Well, let's let, let's imagine, you know, we're, we're fast forwarding to next year, right? And you're sworn in, as governor said, of Wisconsin. In your first on hundred days, what top actions would you take in the in, in that step? Well, I wanna raise wages for Wisconsin. That means increasing the minimum wage and it means restoring collective bargaining rights so that workers have. Power to basically advocate for themselves with employers. I wanna dramatically lower costs, especially on the big ticket items like healthcare that we've talked about, prescription drugs, housing, childcare, utility costs, and I wanna expand freedom. We're, we're living in a very dangerous and scary time right now as Americans. We have a regime in Washington that has essentially turned American communities and American streets into war zones. They have put armed federal agents who are mass. Who are unaccountable and given them free reign to terrorize, brutalize, and even murder Americans. And we need a governor who has a spine of steel and is gonna stand up to them. So a key priority that I have is making sure that we are using every tool at our disposal to protect Wisconsinites from the harms of the Trump administration. Certainly the economic harms of things like tariffs that are crushing our family, farmers, and small business owners like me. But also the very real physical harm that is happening in communities across the country and in our neighboring states of Minnesota and Illinois. Some voters and some of my friends, right? I've, we've had, I've had colleagues that I know that have moved to Canada because they're so concerned about what's going on right now. Right? And so these changes and, and, and these effects in the communities are very tangible for many people. And some voters worry. That these changes can take years, right? In order to reverse or to get to a point of stability, what do you think is low hanging fruit? What do you think can be accomplished quickly in, you know, let's say the first couple months of, uh, you know, you being governor? What do you think could be accomplished in that timeframe? Well, I think we can com accomplish a great deal. First of all, our state for a long time has really starved our public schools and our local governments of the resources they need to thrive. And it's not'cause we don't have the money. It's because we've taken what was once a good progressive tax structure and flattened it so that millionaires and billionaires and big corporations, not only do they not have to pay their fair share, in many cases, they don't really have to pay anything at all. And then that means that the rest of us are shouldering all that burden. Meanwhile, our property taxes are skyrocketing because these local communities and schools have to go to referendum to keep the lights on. You know? Do you wanna see mass layoffs of teachers? Do you wanna see school closures? Do you wanna lose, you know, snowplows from your local community? Well, if not, then you gotta pass these referendums and that puts neighbors in an impossible position, and it's all a result of Republicans fiscal mismanagement of the state. So we can fix that in a budget and we can do a lot to make these statutory changes. Right? To get rid of restrictions on healthcare, to expand access, as I mentioned, open up the state health insurance plan. And by the way, the state retirement pension plan. To anybody to buy in. All of that can be done within the state budget, but only if we have a governor who has the courage and the competence to actually get things done. And I think sometimes the problem that we run into with Democratic elected officials is they might have good ideas, but they're not willing to throw a punch or take a punch, as Nancy Pelosi would say, for the children. And I am, I've spent my. Career almost 25 years in and around state government actually delivering change. And I think when you look at all the good folks who are running for governor, nobody has my track record or my experience of actually getting things done in every kind of legislative environment. Democratically controlled, Republican controlled or split legislature. And I think that is the essential component that we're gonna need to be successful. We can fully fund our public schools. We can stop this voucher scam that is draining. You know, hundreds of millions of dollars a year from our public schools. We can have communities that are, are thriving here in Wisconsin, but we need to have the political courage. To actually get it done and, and the ability to get it done. And I'm the candidate that has shown throughout my career that I have both for listeners who are worried now.'cause again, like you said, a lot of people are, are, are, are, are beside themselves. A lot of people are scared and they have reason to be. What is the one thing that you want them to take away from this conversation? We are in this together and this country has faced unimaginable things in the past. We can defeat this, we can get through this. Not without harm, not without scars, and not without working really, really hard. This is, this is a terrifying time, but this is also an opportunity for us to work together to build a better world. If there's one thing that we can learn from this Republican regime, it's that they are not afraid to use power to hurt people, to take away our rights, to destroy. Our economy and to line their own pockets. They're not afraid to use power. We can use power to make people's lives better, to deliver high quality public education and healthcare and affordable housing, and all the things that we need to thrive as a society if we're willing to use political power. I'm not talking about breaking the law and shredding the constitution the way that Republicans do. Yeah. Let's be clear as a lawyer, but that's deeply offensive to me, but I am talking about electing political leaders. Who have the spine, you know that courage to stand up to these bullies and billionaires as I have throughout my whole career, and have the capability, the knowledge, competence, the experience to put all the chips on the table and say, we are doing this and actually lead. And I think oftentimes that's the missing. That's the missing piece. It's not that we don't have good ideas, it's that we don't have the political courage or the will to get it done. I do, and that's why I'm running. And that's why I hope that your listeners will vote for me on August 11th and November 3rd. Where can people follow your work? How can they get involved in your campaign? How can they get involved? In general, how do they get in contact? So my website is kelda Roys ROY s.com. You can follow me on social media at Calder Roy's on different platforms. I welcome people reaching out to me with their questions, their ideas, their concerns. Um, you know, this campaign, like all of my campaigns, is a grassroots one. It's, uh, not funded by corporate special interests or billionaires, certainly not Elon Musk, whom I called on to be arrested for violating our election bribery laws. It really, you know, this campaign is a series of conversations. With communities in every corner of Wisconsin. I'm a mom from Medford. I feel so lucky to have this opportunity to talk about leading our state, and I really wanna hear from people and earn their support one voter at a time. Absolutely. Well, Senator Roys thank you so much for joining us here today. You know, this is why politics, the at the local level matters so much. I'm Dr. Chris Ford. This has been Post Check, Wisconsin. Thank you so much. Great to see you. Thanks, Dr. Ford.