U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., said he plans to vote “no” on the nominations of U.S. Rep. Tom Price for Secretary of Health and Human Services and Steven Mnuchin for Secretary of the Treasury.
Casey met with each of the nominees, reviewed their records, questioned them at Senate committee hearings as well as submitted follow up questions in writing to both in order to make this decision.
“Rep. Price has been the architect of radical schemes to end the guaranteed benefit of Medicare and cut nursing home funding for seniors by block granting Medicaid,” Casey said in a prepared statement issued to the media on Tuesday. “As a candidate, President Trump pledged not to cut vital programs for seniors like Medicare and Medicaid. Then he chose an HHS nominee who proposed budgets that cut $1 trillion from these vital programs.”
Casey also shared thoughts on Mnuchin.
“During the Great Recession, millions of middle class families in Pennsylvania and across the nation lost their homes and their life’s savings,” he said. “Steve Mnuchin saw ‘an opportunity’ and formed OneWest, which the California Reinvestment Coalition identified as a ‘foreclosure machine.’ He also owned Financial Freedom, which engaged in well documented practices to aggressively foreclose on working families and seniors with reverse mortgages.”
Following the loss of her husband and son, Nellie Milnek of Ruffs Dale in Westmoreland County asked OneWest to adjust her monthly payments. OneWest chose to foreclose on her home instead of working with her to make payments, despite the fact that she had a long record of making her mortgage payments, Casey said.
“According to a WTAE news report, Ms. Milnek was not alone in her suffering,” he said. “Mr. Mnuchin oversaw foreclosures on ‘hundreds of homeowners in western Pennsylvania.’ When Philadelphia’s Ruth Guerriero’s husband signed on to a reverse mortgage without her knowing, Mr. Mnuchin’s financial institution chose to kick her out of her home following her husband’s death. Unfortunately, Mr. Mnuchin said he’s ‘proud’ of his institution’s record.”
