On March 27th I announced that I will ask voters to return me to office for a third term as your Insurance Commissioner. Washington consumers deserve a strong and independent leader to protect their right to prompt and fair treatment by insurers at reasonable costs. I am proud of our accomplishments over the last seven years and pledge to continue the progress we have made. Those accomplishments include: Cutting excessive insurance rate increases by $200 million Helping individual consumers recover over $107 million in delayed payments on their insurance policies Winning passage of legislation to restore regulation of individual health insurance policies Restoring bankrupt malpractice and health carriers to financial solvency Blocking the attempt by Premera/Blue Cross to abandon “non-profit” status Regaining national accreditation for the office Successfully fighting attempts by big out-of-state insurance companies to take away consumer legal     protections A focus of my campaign will be to educate voters on my proposal for a guarantee of quality affordable health care for every Washington resident. The people of our state have a right to a guaranteed level of financial security in the event of a health crisis. With my proposal we can save money and protect our freedom of choice while preserving the private marketplace. I look forward to meeting with as many of you as possible during the coming year so that we can talk about ways to improve this proposal and make it a reality.