Service Employees International President April Verrett made the following statement today on the looming government shutdown:

WASHINGTON, DC -- “For months, working people have been clear. They’ve been making phone calls, they’ve been sending emails, they’ve been showing up to Congressional offices and town halls.

The stealing of our health care to fund tax cuts for people that don’t need them is beyond outrageous, and working people aren’t going to stand for it. And to add insult to injury, Congressional Republicans now want to shut down the government.

And who are they blaming it on? Federal workers? And they’re threatening more layoffs when we’ve already seen tens of thousands of federal workers without jobs because of this administration.

We don’t need to shut down our government for your so-called tax breaks for the wealthy. We need to fund health care for millions of Americans who need it. And we need to make sure federal workers can continue to go about what they want to do everyday, and that is to serve their government, serve their country, like the tens of thousands of SEIU members who do the work of making sure veterans can get health care.

We’ve got to get back to our values. We’ve got to get back to sanity in this country. So let’s go get it.”

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