CUSP Coalition

About CUSP

California United for Single-Payer

CUSP is a statewide coalition winning true single-payer healthcare in California by centering the communities most impacted — through education, organizing, and action on every lever: legislative, ballot, and the national fight they feed.

Health care is a human right. We organize like it.

California United for Single-Payer (CUSP) is a statewide coalition building the people power that will win — and defend — a true single-payer health care system in California: coverage for every resident, no premiums, deductibles, or co-pays, with care decisions made by medical professionals — not corporate middlemen. We believe single-payer will only be achieved by centering and uplifting marginalized communities, addressing the needs of seniors, and engaging rank-and-file trade union members through base-building in every region of the state.

Why we exist

California is the fifth-largest economy in the world, and still people go without care they need because of cost — skipped doses, untreated pain, emergency rooms as last resort, medical debt following families for years. Seniors on fixed incomes stretch the last dollar. Essential workers — the ones who sustain our regions and are barely seen by decision-makers — get the lowest-wage jobs and the thinnest coverage, if any. Meanwhile every premium increase, every deductible hike, every denial letter traces back to the same thing: profit-seeking middlemen sitting between patients and care, getting paid for saying no. We have proven the policy case. Multiples studies have shown for decades that a single-payer system would cover more people and cost California tens of billions less over time than the wasteful, profit-driven system we have now. What California does not yet have is the political power to force it through — because the insurance industry, the drug companies, and the managed-care corporations do. These forces are the puppeteers of the politicans elected to Sacramento and control both major political parties. That is the gap CUSP exists to close. Not with more white papers. With people.

What we're winning

Politicians say "single-payer" while proposing systems that still hand risk and profit to private industry. We are precise, because the details are where the fight is won.

For health care to be truly single-payer, it must have these 4 key elements:

1. One payer — the government — bears the risk. No HMOs, ACOs, or multiple risk-bearing entities such as insurance companies.
2. The one payer covers fixed budgets for institutional providers, including hospitals and nursing homes.
3. Uniform fee schedules for providers.
3. Uniform fee schedules for providers.
Multilingual and culturally competent care that meets the needs of California’s diverse population.
All underserved areas will see investments in health care infrastructure.

A California single-payer system means:

1. All California residents have guaranteed health care for life.
2. No insurance premiums, deductibles, or co-pays — and no mechanism to quietly reintroduce any of them.
3. Health care decisions made by you and your medical professionals. Doctors make care decisions. Not insurance adjusters, not claims processors, not shareholders or AI Bots.
4. No role for insurance companies and profit-making in our health care system. No more corporate middlemen.
5. Multilingual and culturally competent care that meets the needs of California's diverse population.
6. Deliberate investment in rural and other underserved areas, where the current system has already given up on people.

Meet Our Executive Board

The Leadership Team

Temporary Temp

Still awaiting information from this leader.