Alumnus Shamey Cramer, President Obama and the HOPE Act

By Shamey Cramer

If not for LACC, President Obama wouldn’t have invited me to the Oval Office.

In 1984 I began taking classes at LA City College in hopes of getting my Associate Arts degree and transferring to a four-year school for a degree in Film and Television. One year later, I was informed I only had six months to three years to live because I was HIV-positive.

I dropped out of school and returned to Chicago to be close to my family. Thankfully, my health never deteriorated so I went about living my life, but was only able to advance so far professionally. I decided in 2009 to return to my original plan from 25 years earlier and restart my education at LACC.

Having participated in speech and debate in high school, I decided it would be good to hone my public speaking skills because of the political and public nature of my work. I joined the LACC Speech & Debate team led by Professor Jeanne Dunphy and mentored by adjunct Drew Lobenstein.

Game Changer

While competing at the Nationals tournament in Connecticut in April 2011, I noticed a front page article about a research paper published by Johns Hopkins Transplant Clinic that claimed if Congress would remove the 25-year ban to allow for HIV-positive to HIV-positive organ transplants, an additional 600-1,000 American lives could be saved of the 14,000 that die every year by not getting a transplant in time.

I immediately contacted the author of the research paper and pledged my support. One month earlier, my cousin, who was diagnosed with Diabetes when we were 13, became one of the 1,400 Americans now in need of a simultaneous pancreas-kidney transplant. A pancreas can only be from the same cadaver as the kidney, and must match the recipient’s genetic make-up. Although he is HIV-negative, I knew that this legislation change would increase his chances of survival. By granting the ability for HIV-positive patients in need of a transplant to receive organs from HIV-positive donors increases the number of organs available to HIV-negative patients.

After my initial emails with Brian Boyarsky, the J-H medical student who co-authored the research paper, I connected with Kimberly Miller of the HIV Medicine Association. The HIVMA was leading the outreach efforts in DC, and was a key player from the beginning. Before I could join Kimberly in her efforts in Washington, I needed to work on my communication and lobbying skills and was able to do so through my Persuasive Speaking competitions. Speaking on a topic which was very personal to me resulted in always placing within the top three for LACC.

I received my A.A. in June 2012, and on Valentine’s Day, 2013, the HIV Organ Policy Equity Act (HOPE) was simultaneously introduced in the Senate and the House of Representatives. It cleared its Senate Committee hearing in April and was passed by Unanimous Consent in June.

From the Hopper to the Oval Office

I arrived in Washington DC the third week of May 2013. I was there specifically to visit members of Congress to gain their support. The HOPE Team quickly organized and included myself as the volunteer advocate, Kim Miller of the HIV Medicine Association, and Rachel Myers and Mark Lukaszewski of the American Society of Nephrology. We interacted with more than 60 members of the House (all Republican), making more than three dozen in office presentations, and secured the 12 Republican House co-sponsors, of the total 53 House co-sponsors.

Peggy Tighe, legal counsel for the American Society of Transplant Surgeons and a 20-year veteran of government health policy advocacy, secured a pivotal meeting for our team. On July 2, we met with Cheryl Jaeger, the Chief Policy Advisor for then-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. Ten days later, the HOPE Act cleared committee, and was on hold until after the Summer recess.

In the meantime, I used my film degree skills and produced a short video on the HOPE Act that was posted on the HIVMA website and shared with members of Congress as another way to educate them on our work.

Following all the early Fall wranglings of the political parties, which ended up being uglier than usual, the vote was scheduled for November 12, 2013 The two main speakers on behalf of passage – Rep. Fred Upton of Michigan and Rep. Joe Pitts of Pennsylvania – were two well-known conservative Congress members with poor track records for supporting HIV legislation. However, this was one bill where they knew that saving lives also meant saving hundreds of millions of dollars in Medicare expenses due to the reduction of need for dialysis for thousands of Americans with the passage of the amendment.

The bill also passed by Unanimous Consent in the House. Eight days letter, I was stupefied to open my email as I was heading to class at the four-year university I now attend only to discover an invitation from the White House Office on AIDS Policy to attend the Oval Office signing ceremony for the HOPE Act. One small catch: the ceremony was to take place in less than 19 hours from the time I received the email. As a struggling college student, there was no way I could afford an overnight ticket to anywhere!

But my HOPE team-mates all chipped in, and after taking the red-eye, and freshening up at my colleagues’ office, I joined six other Americans – two of them members of Congress – in the West Wing reception room. An hour later, we were told the President was ready to meet us. I was asked to lead the entourage, and my heart was thumping with every step I took down the hallway connecting the West Wing to the White House. As we rounded the corner to stand outside the Oval Office, I asked the White House staffer guiding us what I was supposed to do once I got inside: “I don’t know” was her reply. ”I’ve never done one of these before.”

Before I had time to respond, the door in front of me opened, and less than two feet in front of me was the man himself: Barack H. Obama, the 44th President of the United States. Fortunately, he is less than an inch taller than I, so as he extended his hand, it was a pleasure to be able to look him directly in the eye, knowing I played a key part in getting this bill passed.

Once inside, and following some heartfelt remarks by the President, he got us all laughing when he ended his comments by saying “OK, you better start smiling again because we’re about to let the press in and I don’t get to do this too often!” For the record, the HOPE Act was the 52nd bill he had signed into law during his time in office to that point.

Returning Home

But there was one more thrill yet to be had. As wonderful as it was to be eyeball-to-eyeball with the leader of the free world, nothing will ever compare to the look in my Mother’s eyes the following week when I returned to Chicago for her surprise 90th birthday and showed her the official (framed) White House photo. She was a retired schoolteacher, and was very relieved when I went back to obtain my diploma. To meet the President as a result of my schoolwork made it all the more special to her. Sadly, she passed away just two months later, but no one will ever be able to take either memory away from me.

So thank you, LA City College. The education I received made it possible for me to speak directly to members of Congress with confidence and competence. But also, a special thank you to the LA City College Foundation. The scholarships I received during my years at LACC allowed me to purchase my computer, camera equipment and editing software – all necessary tools for a budding filmmaker whose work has now helped save thousands of American lives.

And I stood behind the President of the United States in the White House Oval Office as he signed a piece of legislation into law that I helped make possible.

And none of that would have happened if not for LACC.