When Fran Krugen’s late husband was first diagnosed with diabetes, his insulin cost about $35 a bottle.

But Krugen, an AFSCME retiree from Arizona, will never forget the day when she and her husband went to the drug store to pick up his insulin and the pharmacist told them it now cost $900 a bottle.

“This was medication he needed to live, and we had insurance,” she said at a press briefing earlier this month. “We looked at each other and had to ask ourselves: Do we make the house payment? Do we buy food? Or do we pay for his medication?”

On August 19th, the Lamont Administration announced Executive Order No. 13D (EO-13D) concerning mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations of state employees who do not qualify for medical or religious exemptions.  For employees not working in state hospitals or long-term care facilities, that mandate includes the ability to refuse the vaccine as long as the employee submits to weekly COVID testing.

Nine months after the attack on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC, it’s important to remember what police officers endured while defending our democracy.

One of them was attacked with a flagpole and sprayed with a chemical.

Another heard someone say, “Kill him with his own gun,” before he was dragged into the crowd, beaten unconscious and repeatedly shocked with his own Taser.

A third was verbally pelted with racial slurs over and over before he was assaulted.

A fourth was crushed in a door, bashed in the head, and nearly lost an eye.