On Tuesday Delegate Mark Berg is being challenged by Chris Collins in a primary in the 29th House District. Your vote should go to Delegate Mark Berg because without him we would not have been able to stop Medicaid expansion and the huge tax increases that would have been necessary to fund it coming years. [read_more]
Mark Berg is the people’s watchdog in the House of Delegates.
As a physician no one knows the health system better than Delegate Berg. No one knows better than Dr. Berg the damage that Obamacare has done to our country. He will make sure that never happens in Virginia. As your representative, Delegate Berg listens to you, he’s had more than 6 Town Hall meetings since he was elected. He listens to the voters and takes care of them in Richmond. (Please don’t believe his opponent’s erroneous mailers, Berg is very responsive to constituents.) Delegate Berg will never vote to raise your taxes or fund medicaid expansion in Virginia.
Delegate Berg has the full support of conservative stalwarts like Senator Dick Black and Delegate Bob Marshall. In Senator Black’s endorsement of Delegate Berg he said,
Delegate Mark Berg was particularly effective in blocking Obamacare in Virginia this year. His intimate knowledge of the so-called “Affordable Care Act” was vital to crafting our strategy that blocked Medicaid Expansion and prevented Gov. McAuliffe from adding 400,000 to the welfare rolls. This conservative victory will have enormous long-term effects on the fiscal stability of the Commonwealth.
We need more legislators like Mark Berg in the General Assembly. His expertise as a doctor is invaluable as we battle to keep Obamacare from taking over Virginia. His unwavering commitment to strong schools is invaluable as we fight to keep Common Core out of Virginia. His knowledge as a businessman is invaluable as we fight to keep taxes low in Virginia.
I am honored to work with Delegate Mark Berg in Richmond because of his steadfast commitment to Virginia’s families.
Sincerely,
Senator Dick Black
Virginia Senate District 13
Delegate Bob Marshall also shared his thoughts about Delegate Berg,
Delegate Mark Berg is the kind of conscientious legislator we need to keep in Virginia’s General Assembly and we can keep Mark there by voting for him on June 9^th in the Republican primary.
I have worked with Mark these past two years and am impressed with his ability to thoroughly review bills hundreds of pages long, and find problems other miss.
I have personally witnessed Mark pour over 400+ page budget bills on the floor of the House of Delegates in the short window before a vote.
Dr.Berg’s rigorous training as a medical doctor enables him to digest complex legislation efficiently and quickly!
It was Delegate Berg who discovered the craftily drawn language in the Virginia Budget that set up a virtually invisible authorization to slip Medicaid expansion through the earlier Budget. Mark’s insights helped Senator Black lead the effort to amend the bill and to stop Gov. McAuliffe’s efforts to craftily expand Medicaid without transparency. Had Delegate Mark Berg not been a Delegate, McAuliffe might have succeeded.
Being a physician, Delegate Berg’s more in-depth understanding of health issues is an asset for voters in Frederick, Winchester and Warren counties who do not want to undermine the delivery of health care services to the underserved, but also do not want more and more expensive, socialistic programs.
This past session, Delegate Berg found a serious flaw in a measure dealing with economic development. Mark informed me of this, and I was able to stop a bill on the House floor that was rolling through the Assembly like a freight train in the night. With Mark’s research, I was able to convince my colleagues to amend the measure. Mark’s good eye caught a problem that likely would have triggered major law suits down the road!
Mark Berg is serious about keeping his Oath of Office to uphold and defend the Constitution. Mark’s decisions are also guided by his conservative principles. He always ask himself, how will families in his district and throughout Virginia be impacted by the legislation being considered.
Mark introduced bills to defend our Second Amendment rights, protect children from sexual abuse, protect the privacy of student personal records, curb the collection and dissemination of license plate reader data, and have police employ body cameras for their and the public’s protection. The introduction of these measures has started a discussion among policy makers, and that is a necessary first step to getting a change in the law.
Bottom line: you can trust Mark Berg to follow through on his commitments. Mark’s desire to serve others by becoming a medical doctor was a great foundation for his dedicated service in politics. We need
Mark Berg standing for all of us in Richmond.Please vote for Mark Berg in the Republican primary June 9th!
Delegate Bob Marshall,
Member House of Delegates 1992 to present
We join Senator Black and Delegate Marshall in urging all voters to vote for a true conservative and protector of the people in the 29th district, Delegate Mark Berg.
28 comments
Ah, now do you people want government in healthcare, or out of healthcare?
This is the hypocrisy. You people do not want government out of healthcare. You want to pick and choose when government is in, and when government is out.
People are literally dying due to not having health insurance. You abandon them, but yet embrace mandated coverage for others, do you not?
Nothing but hypocrits. Liberal, big government, tax and spend, tax increasing whatever.
Before there was Brat there was Berg. Just saying. Mark Berg is rough around the edges, but he is a tremendous asset to have in the GA.
Overall, Dr Berg has a very strong conservative voting ( I would have voted different on some of the law enforcement related and health legislation) record but I don’t expect to agree with any of my representatives 100% of the time.The above statements from Delegate Marshall and Senator Black underscore exactly why he is in trouble tomorrow. No doubt about it, Dr. Berg has the backing of many outstanding conservatives around the state, but very few of them reside in his district and it’s been a huge problem. It’s difficult to win big without local GOP support. Many good, strong conservatives in addition to moderates in Frederick/Winchester have backed Dr. Berg’s opponent. Whoever wins, it will still likely be held by one of the more conservative delegates in the state.
With 20 no votes with bipartisan opposition and multiple members of the caucus leadership voting against the bill, this was not some extreme vote. It is better to understand legislation than pull a random vote out of context.
Are you really this ignorant, or are you just pretending to be? Which members of “leadership” voted against this bill? Bell abstained, that’s about as close as you can get. Cox, Miller, Albo, and Lingamfelter all supported the bill. Even Minchew, LaRock and Ramadan vote yea. The vote was 79 to 17 (not 20), with only 4 abstentions. That’s overwhelming bipartisan *support* with a few idiots on both sides of the table voting against the bill. Stop giving me the dang numbers–tell me *why* it was a good idea to vote against a bill like this.
I laugh at the accusation of being called ignorant. I recommend you look at the vote on the bill. http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?151+vot+HV2857+HB1940
There is a process in the House of Delegates known as “pink slip voting” where if your vote was incorrectly recorded, you can get it fixed. In current reporting you see all of those votes right with the recorded vote on the bill. Shaun Kenney when talking about this process stated, “it’s not hard to figure this one out if you have even a tangential relationship with how the legislative process works.” http://bearingdrift.com/2015/06/04/dunnavant-lied-her-integrity-died/
That you are incorrectly stating how members voted is intriguing. I would reccommend you spend a little more time analyzing the vote for the bill before calling people ignorant, and then maybe you can also take some time to understand why people may be concerned about the bill as well.
Thanks for correcting my mistake on Miller’s misvote Willie but I wasn’t accusing you of feigning ignorance regarding the voting process or the vote tally. My point was that, one significant vote aside, this bill passed with significant bipartisan support. Moreover, the vote tally isn’t really the issue here–the issue is that this vote hurt children with autism, and you refuse to address my question: why did this bill warrant a nay vote? With your close proximity to the political process here in VA, I hope I’m not being too gracious in assuming that it shouldn’t be difficult for you to answer this one.
A few “idiots” on both sides voting no? A vote to expand the MANDATORY coverage of healthcare…. I wonder why only a few voted NO to expand MANDATORY healthcare coverage…. So your are against MANDATORY health coverage —- unless its the advocate issue you feel most compassionate about – – – if one advocate issue is MANDATORY for health care then why not all of them – – wait, wait – its because the government gets to pick and choose which advocate issues are important enough to be “Mandatory” – – – you’re right, those 17 are just some nut whack job “idiots”
Wait…are you confusing this with an individual mandate?
The bottom line is that the Autism bill redefined those “small businesses” that were exempt from the mandatory coverage that the law applied. The definition moved small businesses from being 1-50, to small businesses being 1-100. That leaves those children in the range of 51-100 that were getting coverage, now no longer being eleigible.
Thanks for the insight, Dody.
Interesting. Could you give me a reference? I know the summary of the bill states that the bill, of course, does not apply to small businesses, and then clarifies that small businesses, “as of January 1, 2016, will include employers with no more than 100 employees.” But that seems to be referring to the fact that another, separate bill is making this change. When I search the actual text of the bill (https://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?151+ful+HB1940ER+pdf) for the word “small,” it only comes up once, when referencing the fact that small businesses are exempt. It states nothing about how the bill itself is changing the definition of a small business, so that change most likely is due to another bill. Perhaps I’m missing something here, could you clarify?
Another case of people getting fired up about a bill without, like, actually reading the bill. Just because they call it the “Freedom Act”, for example, doesn’t mean it makes you more free, you have to read the bill to figure out what it does and doesn’t do, and most bills are a mixture of good and bad with nice sounding names.
Again, I *did* actually read the bill, and I saw no reference to a change to the definition of a “small business,” only a mandate that children 2-10 now be covered (as opposed to the previous required coverage of ages 2-6). Can you show me what I’m missing here? I’m sure I missed something, I’d just like someone to point it out.
Comments slandering the candidate with lies have been deleted.
“If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.” – George Washington
We’re not the government. Understand the difference?
Why do we support free speech then? Is it just so you can have the right to yell at the government, or is it to promote the free exchange of ideas? I think we all know how Washington would have answered that question.
No. As principled Conservatives we should seek to uphold the values our nation was founded upon. Why else do we have the right to free speech? Having a culture of free speech is dependent on the actions of citizens and is necessary for a free society.
The discouragement or “chilling” of free speech and the blatant shutting down of free speech are both violations of the Constitution according to the Supreme Court. Cases of “libel” or “slander” must have proven malicious intent behind blatantly false information for these accusations to stand. Neither of these conditions were present in Mr. Macklin’s statement, which you yourself admitted to being accurate when you acknowledged Delegate Berg’s vote regarding Autism coverage.
The Washington Post doesn’t print everything that comes into them. We don’t either, although we censor with much less frequency.
These are comments, not articles. There’s a difference between editorial discretion and the blatant censoring of discussion about the article in question.
Censoring comments? That means The Bull Elephant is no better than Blue Virginia – a propaganda tool.
What lies? Berg voted against this bill to help children with autism: http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?151+vot+HV2857+HB1940
Yes, it’s all about priorities. Localities should be taking care of kids with autism.
Except healthcare laws are decided on the state level. Correct me if I’m wrong but I don’t believe localities could address this situation. Answer me this: why was the law a bad idea? Why shouldn’t the state protect children with autism? Is it because your beloved candidate made a mistake and voted against this bill, or do you actually have some sort of reasoning to back this claim up with?
Now that you admit it is “fact” that Berg voted against this bill, would you please undelete my comment, as it was not simply a “slanderous lie” but merely a statement of the fact that Mr. Berg does not see autism as a priority?
This does not make any sense. Chris Collins is clearly the right business candidate. Mark Berg’s vote harmed kids with autism across the state of Virginia. I cannot believe any right-minded conservative would side with such a traitorous candidate.
This doesn’t make Berg a traitorous candidate, because he has no allegiance to children with autism–only to his fellow TEA partiers who scream about taxation.