Mark Pryor: the Clear Choice for Arkansas Working Families

In his four years as Arkansas attorney general, Mark Pryor (D) has built a strong record of advocacy for workers and consumers. He organized an aggressive state Antitrust Division that targeted corporate corruption and specifically cracked down on large pharmaceutical companies for Medicare fraud and the manipulation of the prescription drug market.

Now Mark Pryor is running for the U.S. Senate on a platform of putting Arkansas’ working families first. His top priorities include providing universal and affordable prescription drug benefits for senior citizens, supporting a strong Patients’ Bill of Rights, improving education and protecting Social Security.

Pryor’s record and positions stand in stark contrast to those of his opponent, incumbent Republican Sen. Tim Hutchinson. In six years in the Senate, Hutchinson has voted on the side of working families just 11 percent of the time, according to the AFL-CIO. In the past two years, Hutchinson has voted to:

• Repeal the tough ergonomics standard which CWA worked more than a decade to win and prohibit the Occupational Safety and Health Administration from issuing a similar rule. Hutchinson’s action puts millions of workers, including many CWA members at continued risk of painful, crippling injury.

• Give away an average of $342,000 per family over the next decade in tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent of taxpayers — people whose incomes average more than $1 million a year — taking away precious resources from Social Security, Medicare, health care and education.

• Deny displaced workers economically harmed by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks $31 billion in desperately needed unemployment and health benefits.

• Advance school vouchers that drain vital resources away from the neediest public schools.

• Oppose guaranteed collective bargaining rights for firefighters, police and other public safety officers in all 50 states.

Pryor and Hutchinson stand poles apart on a host of key issues affecting the lives of working families. For example, Pryor supports a real Patients’ Bill of Rights that would protect working families from managed care abuses and allow patients to sue their health plan if they suffer harm. But Hutchinson voted against legislation to do exactly that.

Pryor has made clear his adamant opposition to the president’s scheme to privatize Social Security, which would place Americans’ retirement security at the mercy of the stock market. Yet Hutchinson voted in 1998 to divert money from Social Security into private retirement accounts.

On the critical issue of making prescription drugs affordable, Pryor stands head and shoulders above Hutchinson. For example, Pryor supports legislation allowing pharmacists to re-import safe, FDA-approved drugs from Canada and sell them to American patients at much lower costs. Hutchinson voted against this bill in the Senate. Pryor also backs legislation to improve seniors’ access to cheaper generic drugs. Most important, Pryor supports comprehensive Medicare prescription drug coverage that works for every senior citizen, rather than enriching pharmaceutical companies or insurance companies. But Hutchinson voted against legislation to do that and instead favors a bill providing weaker benefits through private insurance companies and leaving senior citizens vulnerable to unacceptable out-of-pocket costs.

In addition, the candidates stand on opposite sides when it comes to corporate accountability. Pryor went after corporate wrongdoers as attorney general and will continue to take them on in the Senate. Hutchinson, however, has continually voted to let big business off the hook. He opposes legislation requiring companies to stop overstating their earnings by listing the lucrative stock options they give top executives as expenses. He voted in 1995 to eliminate the corporate minimum tax, a move that would have let corporations like Enron avoid paying any taxes even when they were profitable. And that same year, Hutchinson voted to let companies get away with raiding their employees’ pension funds.

The significance of this race extends far beyond one vote in the Senate. The outcome could determine which party controls the Senate for the next two years, with major consequences on every policy and budget issue that matters (see U.S. Senate: One Vote Makes All the Difference).

Pryor has shown he has the courage and commitment to stand up for CWA members and fight for our working families agenda in the Senate, while Hutchinson consistently sides with the forces of corporate greed and ideological extremism.

In short, Mark Pryor has earned our strong and enthusiastic support in his important campaign to defeat Tim Hutchinson and become the next U.S. senator from Arkansas.

This portion of this website is paid for by the CWA Committee on Political Education - Political ontributions Committee, with voluntary contributions from union members and their families, and is not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.