Citizens’ Posse

In early spring of 2010, the prospects of the US Congress passing comprehensive healthcare reform were looking bleak. The Democrats had caved on the public option, the Blue Dogs were turning red, and Democratic leaders weren’t sure if they had the votes to pass anything.

Most of the mainstream players in the healthcare reform movement were busy on Capitol Hill “making sausage” while the reform bill grew weaker and less popular by the day. An edgier wing of health care reformers, however, were looking to seize the momentum. We had to remind people why reform was needed and we knew that if we could expose the criminal behaviour of Big Insurance, they would be convicted in the court of public opinion.

We surrounded the building, declared it a crime scene, and posted wanted posters of the CEOs.

Luckily, a perfect target presented itself. America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), the top health insurance lobbying group, decided to bring their chief executives and lobbyists together at a fancy hotel in downtown Washington, D.C., for a summit. They sensed they were close to total victory. They needed to plot out their final moves, smoke their final cigars, and cut their final backroom deals.

Health Care for America Now (HCAN) — an alliance of labour unions, the progressive netroots, and a host of community-based organizations — hired Agit-Pop to help them go big, creative, and militant. Our job was to stage a major street action that would finally tell the story right: Americans want affordable universal healthcare; insurance companies don’t because they’re profiting from a broken system.

We decided to cast the CEOs as organized crime bosses who bribed politicians, denied healthcare to the critically ill, and ran real Death Panels for profit. Drawing on the Western movie trope of citizen-justice, we cast participants in the planned rally as a “People’s Posse”, which would be composed of ordinary people called upon to bring these corporate criminals to justice.

Union leaders were skeptical about whether their folks would take to the “posse” frame. But on action day, when their members saw the “CEO Wanted” posters, Citizens’ Posse badges, and crime scene tape, they quickly wanted in. Our action had two marches of 1,500 people each converge on the D.C. Ritz Carlton. At that point, we surrounded the building, declared it a crime scene, and posted wanted posters of the CEOs. We had a rally with rousing speeches about corporate criminals, which culminated with the crowd being deputized with a Citizens’ Posse Oath of Office. Then several union presidents and a VIP posse attempted to enter the hotel and make citizens’ arrests. Ten VIP deputies were eventually taken into custody by the D.C. police.

As a result, the reform movement got a much-needed shot in the arm, and we owned the media cycle for a critical day or two in the homestretch to the vote. The bill (however flawed) eventually passed.

Originally published in Beautiful Trouble.