Jocelyn Benson Shares Plan To Tackle Healthcare Workforce Shortage and Protect Michiganders From

Today, Secretary of State and Democratic nominee for Governor Jocelyn Benson joined medical professionals and students in Traverse City for a roundtable discussion about her plan to tackle the healthcare workforce shortage hitting Michigan, and bring down the rising healthcare costs.

Jocelyn is the only candidate with a plan to cut healthcare costs and expand access to quality, affordable care by investing in our healthcare workforce. At a time when medical bills get more expensive everyday, James voted for the largest Medicaid cut in history — leaving 500,000 Michiganders at risk of losing healthcare coverage. As governor, Jocelyn will cut healthcare costs by holding Big Pharma and insurers accountable for price gouging, while expanding services to rural areas through mobile health clinics, and workforce development. Michiganders deserve a governor who will cut their costs and make life easier, not harder.

“My dad is 67…and we didn't have the care he needed up here in Traverse City, so he had to spend nine days down in Detroit. That meant my mom also had to spend nine days down in Detroit,” said physician's assistant student Amy Rushlow. “So, here you have people who are on Social Security, and because of this need for travel they're just watching their emergency fund go down, down, down, down. If we had this care up in this area, she could have stayed home…So, that just speaks to the shortages we have up here, and the need we have for more providers and various specialties.”

“Everytime I'm in Northern Michigan and Traverse City, I hear heartbreaking stories about how the federal cuts to our healthcare system are hurting hospitals or hurting care providers. Today, to hear from nursing students, and others who aspire to be serving in the system, about how we can do so much more than we're already doing to improve their lives, was both inspiring, illuminating, and gave me a good sense of what we need to do here in Michigan,” said Jocelyn Benson. “It's not lost on me that one of the reasons we are here in this moment, struggling to figure out how to address the Big Beautiful Bill — which was designed to take people off healthcare and make this harder — is because of leaders like my opponent who went to Washington, and instead of trying to solve these issues, made them worse. And so that illuminates the choice in this race even more.”

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