Rep. Eric Massa (D-N.Y.) said he “of course” stands by remarks publicized earlier this week that he would vote against the interests of his district on healthcare if he believes it’s in his constituents’ best interests.
“Of course I do,” Massa said in an interview on Fox News when asked if he stood by his remarkts. “I am always going to cast a vote in the interest of helping my constituents.”
“Until we can solve some of those problem, I’m not going to weathervane an opinion,” he added. “Of course I have to do — as I said clearly — what is good for my constituents, and I’m not going to back off of that.”
Massa is a proponent of a single-payer system favored by liberals, but is seen as unlikely to garner enough votes to pass out of Congress.
He told liberal bloggers last week that he wouldn’t automatically sign onto any healthcare bill to come through Congress.
“I will vote adamantly against the interests of my district if I actually think what I am doing is going to be helpful,” he said.
Massa defended those remarks, saying that Americans shouldn’t want their representatives to be “weathervanes” on public opinion.
“You want your member of Congress to be deliberative,” he said. “You don’t want your member of Congress to stick his or her finger up in the wind and find out what people are saying today, because tomorrow it’s going to be different.”