Seifert campaign continues to hammer Emmer on tort reform
At a GOP gubernatorial debate on Thursday night, Republican Marty Seifert criticized his top GOP rival Tom Emmer on his votes for medical malpractice reform. It appears that Seifert's campaign is continuing the line of attack.
Last night, Seifert's Campaign Chair Jim Knoblach issued an e-mail saying Emmer is one of "very few Republicans who has consistently sided with the trial lawyer lobby and DFL against lawsuit reform that would lower health care costs." The campaign highlighted three floor amendments Emmer voted against. They were instituting medical malpractice liability limits on Ob/gyn doctors, lawsuit protections on ambulance providers and a cap on awards for non-economic, "pain and suffering" losses:
In a recent email to delegates, Emmer for Governor Campaign Chairman Mark Buesgens attempted to defend Rep. Emmer's "no" votes on this important legislation by saying Tom Emmer "is the last person who would oppose comprehensive tort reform." Yet, Tom Emmer has never been the Chief Author of any sort of comprehensive tort reform during his six years in the Minnesota House. And interestingly, Rep. Buesgens voted with Marty Seifert on each of these four votes. In fact, on these votes, over 90% of Republican House members voted "yes" to enact tort reform in Minnesota.
If history is a predictor of the future, Representative Tom Emmer will continue to oppose common-sense lawsuit reform in Minnesota. As Minnesota's families and businesses are struggling with skyrocketing health care costs, and we deal with the fallout of Obamacare, it is absolutely essential that lawsuit reform is enacted in Minnesota.
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During Thursday night's debate (which you can listen to here) Emmer defended himself saying he supports comprehensive tort reform instead of minor approaches:
"When you talk about these piecemeal approaches. You want to give these ambulance drivers a nonliability path. That's great but water will find the path of least resistance and all of a sudden it will be the dispatchers. With the Ob-Gyn's, it will be the nurses and the hospitals. Folks, you have to have comprehensive tort reform and if you look at my record, I have been defending people and their businesses for over 20 years against frivolous lawsuits..."
As the GOP endorsement grows closer, it appears that both Emmer and Seifert will be working to distinguish themselves on issues like this to gain support among undecided GOP delegates. Both Seifert and Emmer say they'll drop out of the race if they don't win party backing on April 30th.
UPDATE: Emmer addresses the issue in a statement discussing his dislike for the health care overhaul bill:
Instead of using this vote as an opportunity to bring up petty differences from the past, Republicans in Minnesota need to unite around the principles of freedom and fiscal responsibility and offer solutions to minimize this federal intrusion into the lives of our citizens, such as my effort to pass the Minnesota Health Care Freedom Act.