Industry-funded groups have recently spent more than a million dollars on television and online advertising in Iowa opposing Democratic plans to expand access to health insurance.

Some ads primarily focus on single-payer plans (often known as Medicare for All), which more than half a dozen presidential candidates are supporting. But Partnership for America’s Health Care Future has used its hundreds of thousands of dollars in the Des Moines market targeting more modest proposals to offer a “public option” on exchanges selling private health insurance policies.

Many central Iowa Democratic activists were surprised and upset to see Loretta Sieman, a longtime West Des Moines city council member, in one of the partnership’s commercials. Sieman spoke to Bleeding Heartland on September 11 about why she opposes the public option and why she agreed to appear in the ad, now in heavy rotation on YouTube as well as Des Moines broadcast and cable stations.

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Sieman introduces herself in the commercial as a Democrat. I had the impression she was a Republican when she served on the West Des Moines city council. Is that accurate? “I was born a Democrat.”

She elaborated, “When I was on the council, everybody was a Republican. Nobody ever asked me. Nobody ever said anything about it, because we don’t run as political parties” in local elections. Sieman recalled that some Republican friends who had raised money for her campaigns were surprised to learn years later she was a Democrat.

Sieman’s voter registration record indicates that she has participated in some Republican primaries, most recently in 2014 and 2016. She explained that she first voted in GOP primaries to help her close friend, former State Senator Mary Kramer. She has supported other Republicans she knew personally. “I’m a very independent voter.”

...https://www.bleedingheartland.com/2019/09/15/loretta-sieman-on-the-public-option-and-why-shes-in-that-ad/