Barber’s approach to the mental-health issue in Congress has been shaped by his career and his experience as a victim of the 2011 shooting in Tucson, Ariz.
He and his family also founded the Fund for Civility, Respect and Understanding while Barber was recovering in the ICU, he noted, with goals of decreasing the stigma of mental illness and combating bullying in schools.
In the Senate, one of the leaders on mental-health issues is Michigan Democrat Debbie Stabenow, whose father began exhibiting behavior now called bipolar disorder when she was in middle school. Stabenow said he went undiagnosed for 10 years, going in and out of hospitals without receiving the help he needed. But once the illness was discovered and a drug was developed, her father was able to monitor his medications like people do for other illnesses and, with therapy, be healthy and successful, she said in an interview.
Stabenow has introduced a bill (S 264) aimed at increasing access to community mental-health services and improving quality by setting criteria for federally qualified community behavioral health centers and allowing them to bill Medicaid. An advocate for mental health and substance abuse provisions in the 2010 health care law (PL 111-148, PL 111-152), she said her measure fills the gap in coverage among those in the community without access to insurance.
Stabenow has also praised the movie “Silver Linings Playbook” for putting a human face on the struggles of a family dealing with bipolar disorder, and she has appeared at news conferences with the movie’s director and lead actor. She said she identifies with the scenes in which the main character wakes up his parents and talks to them about his ideas, noting that her own father — while never violent — would wake up her mother and talk all night.
“That movie, I think for many of us, was something that was a picture of our lives with a loved one. And it also was very hopeful because when he began to take his medicine, when he had the support he needed, things became very hopeful for him,” she said. “That’s my story — there is hope, and my dad got the help he needed and was able to live a productive life with his family.”
Another Senate voice on mental-health care, Minnesota Democrat Al Franken, has introduced two pieces of mental-health legislation in the new Congress: one (S 162) focused on the criminal justice system and another (S 195) designed to increase access to mental-health services in schools. Part of the connection he feels to mental-health issues stems from his wife’s struggle with alcohol dependency and her recovery, which she spoke about in an ad released during his campaign.
“During that period, I learned a lot about not just alcoholism but about recovery and about myself,” Franken said in an interview. “It was a very powerful experience.”
Franken also noted that he had a late comedy partner who was an alcohol and drug user, which was “kind of a source of our splitting up” and that he had friends with addiction problems during his time on “Saturday Night Live.”
Beyond those experiences, he studied behavioral sciences in college and holds the Senate seat of the late Minnesota Democrat Paul Wellstone, who was a leader on mental health.
Lois Lerner, director of exempt organizations for the IRS, arrives for a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on the investigation of the IRS' targeting of political groups. Lerner invoked her Fifth Amendment right to not testify and caused a protest from some committee members when she offered an opening statement and engaged in dialogue with members before invoking the right.
Roll Call has launched a new feature, Hill Navigator, to advise congressional staffers and would-be staffers on how to manage workplace issues on Capitol Hill. Please send us your questions — anything from office etiquette, to handling awkward moments, to what happens when the work life gets too personal. Submissions will be treated anonymously.
