Letter to the editor: Berg has not earned a promotion to senator

Rep. Rick Berg, R-N.D., has betrayed the responsibilities granted to him by the majority of North Dakota’s voters. In 2010, 54 percent of North Dakotans voted for Berg due to, I believe, anger at Washington, politics and the general state of the economy. Berg promised to “bring North Dakota values to Washington” and “do things the North Dakota way.” Now, after less than six months on the job, Berg has decided that the job he was elected to do is complete and it’s time to move on.

Berg’s announcement that he is running for the U.S. Senate should be looked at as a sign of disrespect to all those who voted for him. After less than six months as North Dakota’s only representative, a timeframe that many people wouldn’t be eligible for benefits at with a new job, he believes the voters of North Dakota should promote him. Why? What has he done for North Dakota? Furthermore, what would he bring to the Senate?

The only solid answers would come from his voting record in the House. He has betrayed the elderly, the disabled and the less fortunate by voting to change Medicaid into a block-grant program; he has betrayed all North Dakotans under the age of 55 by voting to convert Medicare into a voucher system (whether he wants to admit to it or not); he has betrayed all North Dakota taxpayers by voting himself a $200,000 tax break while at the same time voting to force the soon-to-be seniors to pay up to $6,500 more per year for health insurance; he has betrayed Red River Valley sugar beet farmers by cutting their funding in a Republican Study Committee; and he has betrayed all of us by voting to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

In fact, I’d say the only people he has represented in Washington are the for-profit insurance industry and the top 1 percent of this country in terms of income (which, of course, he is a member of.)

Now, after less than six months in the House, he wants to spend the next year and a half raising funds and campaigning on our dime and not representing North Dakota as he was elected to do. When North Dakotans are hired for a job, they work until that job is done. That is not what Berg is doing.

For these reasons he doesn’t deserve the support of the people of North Dakota, and he doesn’t deserve to be our representative or our senator.

Mitch Axness

Tags: opinion, letters, medicare, politics, berg