Rep. LaMonica McIver had a long Wednesday.
The New Jersey Democrat arrived at the hospital at 6 a.m. for surgery to remove “a couple of” fibroids — benign tumors in or on the uterus — but left the facility soon after for a rushed trip to Washington, where the House was scheduled at the last minute to vote on a bill to reopen the federal government.
“Me having surgery and having to get on a train ride for two and a half hours to come down to make sure that my constituents know that I’m on their side, it’s beyond worth it, because that’s what they elected me to do,” McIver told NOTUS in an interview Thursday.
The congresswoman scheduled the surgery this week because it was originally slated to be a district work week. But many members were left scrambling to arrange transportation after the Senate passed a bill to reopen the government over the weekend.
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Because of shutdown-related staffing shortages, thousands of flights were delayed and canceled across the country, leaving many Americans to find alternative transportation — congresspeople included. In perhaps the most extreme example, Rep. Derrick Van Orden rode more than 900 miles on his motorcycle from Wisconsin to the East Coast in near-freezing temperatures.
The deal, which eight Senate Democrats supported, green-lights a Republican-approved continuing resolution that funds the government through Jan. 30., pays out the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program through 2026,and reverses much of the mass federal employee layoffs enacted by the Trump administration during the shutdown.
In exchange, Democrats were promised that the Senate would hold a later vote on a health care measure of their choosing.
McIver said that she decided that she would rush to D.C. for the vote if she was able after speaking with constituents who face devastating increases in their health insurance premiums if Affordable Care Act subsidies are allowed to expire at the end of the year.
She said her neighbor told her they wouldn’t be able to keep their health insurance if premium prices dramatically increased.
“She was like, ‘I thought we were going to be able to get through this and I was going to be able to continue to keep my healthcare, like I really have to get rid of it now,’” McIver said.
For McIver, the brush with the health care system was its own reminder about the importance of her work in Congress.
“Hell, health care is expensive for me too,” she told NOTUS, adding that she already rescheduled the procedure several times and had begun to take medication she purchased in preparation for it, making rescheduling again an unappealing option.
“I can’t just cancel out this thing after going through all the preparation for it and then just saying I’m not going to do it,” McIver added.
So instead of rescheduling, she hopped on a train with her husband from New Jersey to D.C. without telling her doctors, knowing they would disapprove. McIver told NOTUS that she is fortunate her husband could take care of her during the day and that she was able to ride the train instead of driving.
The surgery and subsequent trip were just the start of a difficult week for McIver. A judge on Thursday denied her motion to dismiss criminal charges brought by the Trump administration against her earlier this year.
In June, McIver was charged with two counts of “assaulting, resisting, impeding, and interfering with a federal officer” and one count of “assaulting, resisting, impeding and interfering with federal officers.”
“We are disappointed by the court’s opinion and firmly believe that this indictment should be dismissed based on the Congresswoman’s legislative immunity and because she is being selectively and vindictively prosecuted,” Hanna Rumsey, McIver’s communications director, told NOTUS in a statement.
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