First lady Michelle Obama’s guests for the State of the Union speech on Tuesday will include a Chicago man and a Schaumburg woman, a White House official said.
Cedric Rowland, the Chicagoan, works for Near North Health Service Corp. and helps people across the country find plans under the Affordable Care Act, the official said.
He’s helped people including Stephanie Lucas, a diabetes patient who was helped by the health care law and who will watch from the White House as President Barack Obama delivers the final State of the Union speech of his administration, the official said.
Gloria Balenski, of Schaumburg, and her family were hit hard by the recession, and she wrote to the president last year to thank him for policies that helped her family “bounce back,” the official said.
Though she lost her longtime job and her husband had a major heart attack in 2012, resulting in $400,000 in medical bills, today she is retired and her husband has recovered, the official said.
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