She touts the ideas of husband John Kerry, a presidential candidate, and
bristles at questions about her wealth.
By JONATHAN ROOS
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
June 30, 2004
Teresa Heinz Kerry touted her husband's health-care plan and brushed aside
questions about her wealth in a Des Moines campaign appearance Tuesday.
Heinz Kerry discussed Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry's ideas
during a visit to a Des Moines community health center, the Primary Health
Care Outreach Clinic.
Her husband, a Massachusetts senator, would have the federal government
assume much of the cost of catastrophic cases, "so no one has to go to the
poorhouse," Heinz Kerry said.
When a reporter's question turned to the Heinz ketchup fortune and how that
might affect voters' perceptions, she was quick to fire back.
She said a claim that the size of her wealth is approaching $1 billion is
"so ludicrous it makes you laugh. People can write and say anything they
want. I have no recourse to correct it. I just have to do my work. You
measure people by what they do with their lives."
Heinz Kerry was first married to H. John Heinz III, who died in a plane
crash in 1991 while he was a senator from Pennsylvania. She and John Kerry
were married in 1995.
"If I happen to have inherited money, well, it was a very sad day when that
happened. . . . I would rather have my late husband alive than to have
gotten the money," Heinz Kerry said.
She also said the Heinz corp- oration shouldn't be lumped in with companies
criticized for sending jobs overseas.
"I know some people say . . . Heinz outsourced 70,000 jobs. That's so crazy.
That's not true," she said, adding that she has nothing to do with the
company. "I bet you that the stuff that is eaten in America, made by Heinz,
is grown and made in America."
John Kerry has made corporate "outsourcing" of jobs an issue in his campaign.
Heinz Kerry, accompanied by Christie Vilsack, wife of Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack,
made no mention of her husband's pending selection of a running mate. The
governor is on the list of those under serious consideration.
Tom Vilsack was born and raised in Pittsburgh. Heinz Kerry's longtime
residence and the headquarters of the Heinz Family Philanthropies, which she
chairs, also are in Pittsburgh.
Heinz Kerry began her Iowa trip in Davenport, where she visited a child-care
center.
