Week in Review: Goldwater Launches Plan to Unleash Healthcare Innovation

Breakthroughs in science are making it possible to fight diseases in ways never before imaginable. Lifesaving treatments are within our reach. Yet government is standing in the way. America needs a revolution in healthcare, and the Goldwater Institute has a plan to do it.

This week, Goldwater launched a prescription for transforming America’s healthcare system. In Putting Patients First: Unleashing Innovation in American Healthcare, we lay out a series of bold new laws that we will pursue in all 50 states and in Washington, D.C., to help make reform into reality.

We’ve done it before. Our landmark Right to Try law upheld the principle that you—not the government—have the right to decide to pursue potentially lifesaving medical treatments. Passed in 41 states and signed into federal law in 2018 with overwhelming bipartisan support, Right to Try ensures that the government does not get a veto stamp over a lifesaving treatment when it is available and recommended by your doctor. And today, Right to Try is saving lives.

Now, we’re super-charging Right to Try and putting patients first through reforms that will ensure that Americans can access cutting-edge medication, that doctors have the best information about new treatments, and that government “expert panels” don’t prevent vulnerable patients from getting the care that they need. Goldwater has even more in store for U.S. healthcare, and you can read about our plan to unleash innovation in American healthcare here.

Mississippi Follows Goldwater’s lead in Breaking Down Barriers to Work

Add Mississippi to the growing list of states that that are protecting hardworking Americans’ right to earn a living by enacting the Goldwater Institute’s landmark Breaking Down Barriers to Work Act and universally recognizing out-of-state occupational licenses.

Currently, one in four jobs in America requires an occupational license—a government permission slip to work. In many states, new residents are forced to spend extra time and money to complete additional testing or training just to be relicensed to do the same job they’ve already been doing in another state. Under Mississippi’s new law, if an individual has held an out-of-state license in good standing for at least one year, he or she is qualified to apply for and be quickly approved for a license in Mississippi.

The Goldwater Institute has enacted Breaking Down Barriers to Work in nearly 20 states in less than two years, and it has already helped thousands of Americans. We have introduced our reform in dozens more states, and we’re going to keep working until it’s the law of the land. You can read more about Breaking Down Barriers to Work here.

A New Goldwater Must-Read: Predators, Not Protectors: How Asset Forfeiture Undermines the Legitimacy of Government

How legitimate can government be if the very people who are supposed to protect us are undermining our rights, taking our property, and discarding the due process of law? That’s exactly what happens with a law called civil asset forfeiture, which allows the government to seize people’s cash, cars, or other property by claiming it was involved with a crime.

In a new policy paper released this week, Predators, Not Protectors: How Asset Forfeiture Undermines the Legitimacy of Government, Goldwater Vice President for Litigation Timothy Sandefur looks at how forfeiture doesn’t just violate the constitutional rights of due process, but also contradicts the more basic principles of government legitimacy.

Forfeiture is big business, too: Local, state, and federal officials seize more than $3 billion each year—an amount so large that many law enforcement agencies have become essentially dependent on this outside income. Rather than being funded with tax dollars, these agencies now derive a large portion of their budgets from money taken directly out of the pockets of citizens who are never convicted of, or even charged with, crimes.

The Goldwater Institute is winning victories on behalf of individuals who have been unjustly targeted under civil asset forfeiture laws, and we’re also working to reform these laws to prevent government from abusing our rights to begin with. Read Sandefur’s new paper here and read more about Goldwater’s work on civil asset forfeiture here.