[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 32 (Wednesday, February 26, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1136-S1140]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              HEALTH CARE

  Mr. JOHANNS. Yesterday I had the opportunity to come to the floor of 
the Senate and talk about ObamaCare's broken promises for our Nation's 
seniors.
  The administration's most recent proposal to significantly cut 
Medicare Advantage is certainly not news to my colleagues on the floor 
today. During the health care debate, we warned over and over again 
that cutting $\1/2\ trillion from Medicare to fund ObamaCare would have 
disastrous consequences and that it certainly would not strengthen 
Medicare. The law drains $308 billion from a very well-received 
Medicare Advantage Program.
  The stories from Nebraskans illustrate how these cuts are hurting 
senior citizens. I heard from a couple in Carney, NE. They wrote to me 
saying that the Medicare Advantage plan they had for several years was 
something they liked. It was a plan that worked for them, but that 
plan, because of ObamaCare, was cancelled. She went on to say to me 
that another plan was going to cost more money and higher rates were 
coming for them.
  She said: ``I have not been shy about telling people that we lost our 
insurance plan thanks to ObamaCare!''
  I could add to that that she has lost her insurance plan--and 
thousands of others, tens of thousands of others across the United 
States--because of the votes of the majority and the President.
  A Nebraskan from Hastings shared that her Medicare Advantage plan was 
discontinued and her new Medicare Advantage plan option was, get this, 
357 percent more expensive. Is that fair treatment to that senior 
citizen?
  When ObamaCare was passed, we tried to get amendments done that if 
there were any savings in Medicare, it would go back to Medicare to 
protect the system. That was voted down by the majority.
  What we ended with is a situation where those funds were pulled out 
of Medicare and used to finance ObamaCare. For millions of Americans 
and about 35,000 Nebraskans who rely upon Medicare Advantage, this law 
has not delivered on its promises.
  As I have said over and over since this debate began, I have been 
committed to ensuring that Medicare is sustainable for decades to come, 
not only for the current generation but for our children and our 
grandchildren. The health care law does not accomplish this goal, and I 
believe strongly it needs to be repealed.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Wyoming.
  Mr. BARRASSO. I come to the floor also to talk about a letter I got 
from Wyoming from a constituent, Traci, who lives in Rock Springs, WY. 
She is very concerned about the health care law. It is interesting 
because she writes after hearing on the news last week a clip of 
Secretary Sebelius. It is a clip where Secretary Sebelius claims there 
is no indication that the ACA is responsible for any job loss.
  Traci in Rock Springs, WY, sees Secretary Sebelius on television and 
wants to let the country know--and I am doing that for Traci today--
that the Secretary is wrong.
  Traci says: ``My life is a prime example. Let me explain just how the 
ACA has destroyed my life.''
  The quote she is referencing is Secretary Sebelius last week said: 
``There is absolutely no evidence, and every economist will tell you 
this, that there is any job loss related to the Affordable Care Act.''
  It almost seems like a deliberate deception, an effort by the 
Secretary to mislead the American people, saying: Who are you going to 
believe, Secretary Sebelius or your own two eyes when you see what is 
happening in your own communities?
  That is why Traci wrote to me from Rock Springs, WY.
  Traci said she works full time. She also maintains a number of part-
time jobs. She has a master's degree.
  She says: ``Once the ACA was passed, I saw the writing on the wall, 
and so did the companies I work for.''
  Isn't it interesting that Traci in Rock Springs, WY, could see the 
writing on the wall, the companies she worked for could see the writing 
on the wall, and yet the Democrats in this body who voted for this law 
couldn't see the writing on the wall.
  She said she had health insurance and that these companies wouldn't 
have had to provide her with anything because she had insurance--
wouldn't have had to provide her with anything. But they didn't know 
who might and might not have insurance, and they weren't taking the 
chance that they would have to offer health care to a large number of 
people. So what these companies basically did, she said, was hire a 
specific number of individuals full time and thus those of us who 
remained part-time employees have been cut way back. This is obviously 
impacting her wages, her take-home pay, the things that matter to her, 
and it seems that Democrats, including Secretary Sebelius, couldn't 
care less.
  It was interesting. I came to the floor yesterday with an article 
from the New York Times last week about all of these public jobs, 
people working for public schools, people working for community 
colleges, sanitation workers for communities, counties--all of these 
people having their hours cut, their take-home pay cut, their wages 
cut, and it is because of the health care law, specifically because of 
the health care law.
  Traci continues:

       I can't believe in a country my grandfather came to and 
     lived the American dream is actually actively trying to 
     prevent me from being able to do the work I want to do. The 
     kind of work I am good at. The kind of work that others 
     benefit from. What was the comment last week about how I am 
     being liberated from my job to do what I truly want.

  It is astonishing. What she says is: I was doing what I truly wanted.
  But yet, according to the Democrats, according to Nancy Pelosi, the 
former Speaker of the House, she is now being

[[Page S1137]]

liberated from the job to do what she truly wants to do--when we have 
somebody with a master's degree, someone who loves to teach, and not 
being able to do what she truly wants to do.
  Continuing:

       And now this government is actually preventing me from what 
     I want to do, doing what I like to do, doing what I am meant 
     to do.

  This is a woman in Wyoming doing what she wants to do, what she likes 
to do, what she wants to do, and was meant to do as a teacher--because 
of this health care law.
  It is not only in Wyoming. I read a story on the floor yesterday of a 
school district in Connecticut, Meriden, CT, where the superintendent, 
who is on a national board of school districts, said: What am I 
supposed to do? If I am going to provide by law all of these part-time 
workers--who are working over 31 hours--health insurance, what I am 
going to have to do is fire five reading teachers. How can I make that 
decision and that tradeoff?
  Instead, they cut their hours to less than 30 hours a week, but yet 
Kathleen Sebelius says there is absolutely no evidence relating to job 
loss in the Affordable Care Act.
  My friend Traci writes: ``So Obama care--has cost me a lot of jobs, 
has cost me about half of my income.''
  When the President of the United States is saying we need to raise 
the minimum wage, why is the President of the United States ignoring 
Traci, her income, her wages, and her take-home pay? Why is his health 
care law making her life worse?
  She said: ``So Obama care--has cost me a lot of jobs, has cost me 
about half of my income.''
  She continues:

       And by the way I was one of those taxpayers that don't have 
     any deductions generally to take other than my mortgage, so 
     when you used to get a lot of taxes from me, by decreasing my 
     income in half, your tax revenue is decreasing in half as 
     well. So next time Sec. Sebelius claims that there are no 
     indications of any job loss, you can tell her that I have 
     lost multiple jobs and I am not being ``liberated.''

  That is what the American people are facing. That is what the 
President of the United States denies every day when he refuses to give 
voice to the suffering that his health care law is causing all across 
this country in all 50 States. It is time that we work together, get 
solutions for the health care needs of this country, and not continue 
under what is happening with the President's health care law--which, 
case after case after case, is not yet giving the American people what 
he promised them and is giving them a lot worse. It is hurting their 
lives, it is hurting their health, and it is hurting their take-home 
pay.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Republican whip.
  Mr. CORNYN. I thank the Senator from Wyoming, who is one of the most 
knowledgeable, eloquent Members of our side of the aisle or in this 
Chamber on the subject of health care law. As a former practicing 
orthopedic surgeon, he knows the subject better than almost anyone I 
know.
  But we are on the floor today to talk about the cuts to the only real 
choice that seniors have when it comes to their health care coverage 
under Medicare. There are basically two choices. One is called Medicare 
Advantage, which I will talk more about in a minute, and the other is 
Medicare, traditional Medicare, which is a fee-for-service program that 
many people find is less advantageous to them than Medicare Advantage.
  Close to 16 million people currently receive health care benefits 
through Medicare Advantage--about 1 million of them in Texas, the State 
I am honored to represent. Of course, they represent roughly 30 percent 
of all Medicare beneficiaries.
  Why would somebody choose Medicare Advantage rather than traditional 
Medicare? Because it gives a lot more flexibility and greater patient 
choice. It actually delivers better results than traditional Medicare. 
It has been one of the main sources of innovation when it comes to 
health care, producing better outcomes for seniors under Medicare. 
Medicare Advantage is the primary driver.
  Unfortunately, the President's health care law, known as the 
Affordable Care Act, or ObamaCare, slashed about $300 billion from 
Medicare Advantage. My constituents are already going to start to see 
premium increases to their Medicare Advantage policies. Many of them 
will have to then question whether they can afford that, whether they 
will drop Medicare Advantage, lose the choices, the flexibility, the 
innovation that goes along with it, and end up basically turning to 
traditional Medicare fee-for-service.
  In Texas, about two out of every three doctors will see a new 
Medicare patient because it actually reimburses physicians at a lower 
rate than regular health insurance does, so many doctors have found 
that they have to limit their practice, much as they have under 
Medicaid as well.
  But we know that the $300 billion that has been taken from Medicare 
Advantage, and these seniors--who rely on it to shore up the Affordable 
Care Act or ObamaCare--know that the news on ObamaCare continues to 
unwind and bring us bad news almost every day. Not only have millions 
of people lost their existing health care coverage, even though they 
were promised by the President of the United States that if you like 
it, you can keep it--I lost count of how many times the President made 
that statement, but I think it is somewhere in the high twenties. Of 
course, now we are finding out that more and more people are having to 
pay higher premiums as a result of ObamaCare.
  Another promise the President made is he said that a family of four 
would see a reduction of $2,500 in their average premiums, but they are 
seeing their premiums go up. Indeed, on Friday, in a late-afternoon 
news dump--that has become a new art form for the administration, they 
dump news on Friday afternoon and hope nobody notices, or it won't be 
covered--we learned that roughly two-thirds of the people who work for 
small businesses will see an increase in their premiums as a result of 
ObamaCare, some 11 million small business employees.
  The people who are concerned about Medicare Advantage aren't only on 
this side of the aisle. In fact, we have had bipartisan accolades for 
Medicare Advantage, called a great success by both Senators from New 
York, for example, and the chairman of the Democratic Senatorial 
Campaign Committee from Colorado. They recently joined me, along with a 
couple of dozen colleagues, to urge CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner 
to ``maintain payment levels that will allow [Medicare Advantage] 
beneficiaries to be protected from disruptive changes in 2015.''
  This bipartisan support for this important choice for seniors, known 
as Medicare Advantage, is in real jeopardy as they are going to see as 
a result a $300 billion cut from Medicare Advantage in order to shore 
up this failing experiment in big government known as ObamaCare.
  People's existing health care arrangements are in serious jeopardy 
and they are concerned and they are calling and writing us and 
wondering what we are going to do. Unfortunately, those calls and 
letters seem to fall on deaf ears, as far as the President and the 
people who voted for this bill are concerned. The American people have 
seen they are whistling past the graveyard and hoping that what will 
likely happen in November--which will finally be the day of electoral 
accountability--is that their voices will actually be heard.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Nebraska.
  Mrs. FISCHER. Mr. President, I rise to speak on behalf of the 35,000 
Nebraska senior citizens who are enrolled in Medicare Advantage. These 
Nebraskans are going to face fewer choices, increased premiums, and 
decreased benefits because of ObamaCare's latest cuts. I am especially 
concerned with how these cuts will impact rural Nebraskans who may be 
forced out of the program altogether due to the lack of available 
plans.
  The administration has already taken over $700 billion from Medicare 
to prop up ObamaCare, and $308 billion of that is from the popular 
Medicare Advantage Program to fund this failed health care experiment. 
These cuts to health services for seniors only hasten the demise of 
this successful program, a program that has improved the lives of 
millions of seniors across this great country. Medicare Advantage works 
for them.

[[Page S1138]]

  Too many promises have already been made and broken, so let's not 
break another promise to America's seniors.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Indiana.
  Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I think nearly every Member of this body 
shares the goal of increasing access to affordable health insurance and 
helping American families receive the best coverage to meet their 
specific needs. So the question before us today--and the question 
before us this entire Congress--is how are these goals being achieved. 
This has been an issue we have been debating since 2010, when ObamaCare 
was signed into law.
  Based on the extraordinary feedback from Hoosiers, regardless of 
party affiliation or ideology, the overwhelming number of messages that 
have been sent to my office, and that I have heard while traveling 
across the State of Indiana, suggest that the Affordable Care Act has 
turned out to be a dismal failure. It is hurting more families than it 
is helping.
  To top it all off, the administration, late last Friday afternoon 
once again cut one of the most popular programs available to seniors--
Medicare Advantage. We have 230,000 Hoosiers enrolled in Medicare 
Advantage plans who could be told major cuts will be made to their 
plans in order to pay for ObamaCare.
  What an irony. We pass a program to provide health care coverage for 
senior citizens. They sign up for the program. They make the choice on 
their own to pay higher costs for Medicare Advantage so they get better 
coverage, and the administration simply says: We need to rebalance 
things so we are going to do everything we possibly can to make it more 
difficult and more expensive. This was their choice, but the 
administration is saying: We are going to make it our choice that this 
program is going to be reduced and much harder to engage in.
  Consider what is happening. This administration is cutting billions 
of dollars from Medicare Advantage--an extremely popular program not 
just in my State but across this country--to pay for ObamaCare, which 
is extremely unpopular. So the administration takes a plan that works, 
a plan that people support, because it is their choice and they are 
willing to pay for it, and the administration says: No, we are going to 
take that away from you so we can cover the cost for a plan that is not 
popular. This is the irony of ironies, particularly in terms of meeting 
the goal that I think all of us want to meet.
  So we have yet another broken promise. The President so famously said 
over and over again: If you like your plan, you can keep it. If you 
make a choice as to how you want to be covered, what benefits you want 
to have, what premium you want to pay, you can keep that--but now he is 
saying, well, no, effectively, you can't keep it because we are going 
to take that away from you.
  It is no wonder I receive tens of thousands of pieces of mail and 
phone calls from Hoosiers all across my State saying: I got duped here. 
I got lured into something that supposedly was going to make medical 
care less costly; that I would be able to keep my doctor, I would be 
able to stay with my hospital, I would be able to keep the benefits in 
the plan I chose, and now I am being told, no, none of that is going to 
work.
  As was just stated by Senator Cornyn of Texas, there is a bipartisan 
effort underway to send a message to the President. It urges the 
President to preserve Medicare Advantage and the incentives to join it. 
I know the President doesn't want to listen to Republicans and have 
them tell him what is happening in their States, what their suggestions 
are as to what to do to fix this disaster of a health care plan, but 
maybe he should listen to Members of his own party. There is a 
significant number of Democrats who have said: We don't want these cuts 
to be imposed on Medicare Advantage. We don't want to go home and tell 
our constituents they can no longer have their Medicare Advantage plan.
  So if the President doesn't want to listen to us, I fully understand 
that. He has made that very clear. But perhaps he should listen to 
Members of his own party and listen to what they are saying. Let's give 
people the ability to make choices and keep the plan they have chosen 
and not have it taken away by a bureaucracy that simply makes decisions 
for them.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I compliment my colleagues who have been 
talking about Medicare Advantage today. It is amazing to me that this 
administration will take money from Medicare Advantage--a program 
people love and that works well, where they can have their own doctors 
and their own health care providers--and put it into ObamaCare--a 
program that is not working and people are not happy with--and we wind 
up with a lot of dissatisfied people in this country and with good 
reason for their dissatisfaction.
  So I rise to join my colleagues in speaking out against the harm 
ObamaCare is already causing to seniors throughout the country who rely 
on Medicare Advantage. I have heard from many seniors in my home State 
of Utah who are worried about the impact further cuts to the Medicare 
Advantage Program could have on their personal health care.
  For example, James and Maureen of Spanish Fork, UT, sent a letter 
describing how they have been personally affected by the hundreds of 
billions of dollars taken from Medicare Advantage to pay for 
ObamaCare--to take money from a program that works, that people are 
happy with, that they pay for, and put it into ObamaCare where it 
doesn't work, they are not happy with it, and it even costs the 
government more money.
  James and Maureen were informed some time ago that their current 
doctors and most providers in their area will no longer be covered as a 
part of their plan's network. In Maureen's words:

       If further funding is taken from the Advantage programs, 
     more and more providers will stop accepting these plans. 
     Where will we go to seek medical treatment?

  Maureen also said that similar to many other seniors, she and her 
husband ``worry about what will be next.''
  These are common stories. Seniors throughout Utah and the Nation are 
seeing their health care options dwindle because President Obama and 
the Democrats in Congress raided Medicare Advantage to pay for their 
misguided ObamaCare and what they call their health care law.
  We all remember when the President promised under ObamaCare if you 
like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. Yet because of the law's 
cuts to Medicare Advantage, people such as James and Maureen are being 
forced to find new doctors and health care providers. As each day 
passes, fewer and fewer options are available to them. This is just 
another example of broken promises that came part and parcel with 
ObamaCare.
  On top of the problems with Medicare Advantage, a new report issued 
late last week from the Chief Actuary from the Centers for Medicare & 
Medicaid Services had even more troubling news. Buried in the report--
which was 2 years late, by the way--is the confirmation that ObamaCare 
will raise insurance premiums for 11 million employees of small 
businesses.
  You heard that right. The Obama administration's own actuary found 
that under the President's health care law 11 million workers will see 
their premiums rise. As I said, this report was 2 years late, and it is 
no wonder why the administration sat on it for as long as they did.
  This is just the latest in a long line of bad data we have seen about 
this misguided law. Yet the administration refuses to step away from 
its talking points and acknowledge the truth--that the health care law 
is fundamentally flawed and is not working as promised.
  All of the problems we are seeing are confirming over and over that 
the best path forward would be to repeal ObamaCare and replace it with 
patient-focused, commonsense reforms that will actually lower costs and 
expand options for the American people. I hope eventually that is the 
path we take.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, in July of 2009, President Obama said: ``If 
you like your doctor, you keep your doctor.

[[Page S1139]]

If you like your current insurance, you keep that insurance. Period, 
end of story.'' Then later, in September of 2009, the President said: 
``Now these steps [ObamaCare] will ensure that you--America's seniors--
get the benefits you've been promised.''
  Well, Mr. President, last Friday we saw yet another group of 
Americans fall victim to the Democrats' broken ObamaCare promises, and 
this time it was America's seniors. ObamaCare cuts of over $300 billion 
to Medicare Advantage are already hurting seniors who rely on that 
popular program for their health care needs. More than 15 million 
seniors, close to about 30 percent of all Medicare recipients, are 
enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans.
  The Wall Street Journal reports that approximately one out of every 
two new Medicare enrollees chooses Medicare Advantage. Seniors often 
choose Medicare Advantage because it is a more comprehensive and 
cohesive way to get health care services and it offers seniors the 
chance to pick a plan that is right for them instead of a one-size-
fits-all approach picked for them by Washington, DC.
  The administration's additional cuts to Medicare Advantage announced 
last week will make it even harder for America's seniors to keep their 
benefits, plan, and preferred doctor. The Kaiser Family Foundation 
estimates that more than one-half million seniors will lose their 
current plans in 2014, which is a direct violation of the President's 
promise.
  This administration's cut to Medicare Advantage in order to try to 
pay for ObamaCare is having real-world impacts on people throughout the 
country.
  A constituent of mine, Cheryl from Box Elder, SD, wrote to me this 
past week and said:

       My husband and I both pay for a Medicare Advantage Plan. . 
     . . We have already had our original policy cancelled because 
     of ObamaCare. And our prescription costs have increased for 
     the same reason. So I am practically begging you to do all 
     you can to keep our Advantage Plan from being cut.

  Every Senator who voted for this train wreck owes America's seniors 
such as Cheryl an explanation for these Medicare cuts, which are 
already resulting in canceled plans, higher costs, and reduced access 
to the doctors they had and liked.
  When the ObamaCare legislation was being debated and these proposed 
cuts to Medicare were being advanced, many of us said this would be a 
big mistake because what they were essentially doing was cutting 
Medicare--particularly Medicare Advantage, which is especially helpful 
to a lot of seniors across this country and which is working out 
there--taking the savings and then using them to pay for a whole new 
entitlement program.
  At the time we talked about this--and, of course, because of the 
weird conventions used in trust fund accounting here in Washington, the 
hundreds of billions of dollars that were cut from Medicare were not 
only then used to pay for this new entitlement program, ObamaCare, but 
were also credited to the Medicare trust fund. Their argument was that 
they were preserving and extending the lifespan of Medicare, and at the 
same time they were using these savings from the cuts coming in 
Medicare Advantage to pay for a whole new entitlement program. I think 
for most Americans this would be spending the same money twice. It 
would be double-counting revenue.
  Essentially what they are saying is this: We are going to put an IOU 
into the Medicare trust fund which at some point in the future we are 
going to have to redeem to pay benefits, and this is going to require 
us to borrow more money.
  It is intergovernmental debt. We talk about publicly held debt, which 
is debt held by the public, but there is also intergovernmental debt, 
which adds to the total debt burden we place on American citizens and 
which is debt that we are going to have to pay back in the future.
  Essentially, all they have done is put a promissory note--an IOU--
into the trust fund. At some point in the future when we need to be 
able to pay benefits to beneficiaries, we are going to have to borrow 
the money to redeem that IOU.
  Essentially, they were able to argue that we were somehow extending 
the lifespan of Medicare at the very time these cuts were being made 
and also at the same time paying for a whole new entitlement program 
under ObamaCare. It was spending the same money twice. It was double-
counting revenue--something which anywhere else in the country would 
probably land most Americans in jail.
  That being said, these Medicare Advantage cuts are now having real-
world impact--something we predicted all along.
  The reason Medicare Advantage is a popular program and the reason one 
in two new beneficiaries is signing up is that it gives you options. It 
gives you choices. It provides competition, which is something we need 
to have more of, not less of, in health care today.
  If you want to put downward pressure on prices, if you want to 
constrain utilization in health care, then create competition out 
there. Give people more ownership, more skin in the game. Give them 
some personal investment in their own health care decisions.
  As it is, with the traditional Medicare Program we have a fee-for-
service Medicare Program. Many seniors are enrolled in that. But 
Medicare Advantage gave them another option--an option that presented 
choices and opportunity to cover things they want to see covered in 
their health care plans. And it has worked. It has been an effective 
program, one that I think most people point to as a success.
  So we are going to cut the very program that is working perhaps the 
best out there in terms of meeting the health care needs of America's 
seniors in order to fund a whole new entitlement program, ObamaCare, 
and in the meantime end up with these higher premiums, canceled 
coverages, and all the dislocations that are coming as a result of 
these Medicare Advantage cuts to seniors across this country. That is 
the wrong way to approach this issue.
  There is a much better way, one that relies more on the very things 
on which Medicare Advantage is based--more competition, more choice, 
more options--and wouldn't lead to canceled coverages, higher premiums, 
higher deductibles, and fewer doctors and hospitals to choose from for 
America's seniors. But that is exactly where we are, and American 
seniors are now experiencing the very thing a lot of other Americans 
have already experienced. People who get their insurance on the 
individual marketplace have seen a lot of these canceled coverages 
already. They have seen these huge increases in premiums.
  Many of us have been here on the floor reading constituent mail and 
emails from families and individuals who have been adversely impacted 
and harmed by ObamaCare because of canceled coverage, higher premiums, 
higher deductibles, and loss of doctors and hospitals. We have seen 
this in the individual marketplace. We are starting to see this--and we 
will see more--in the small business, employer-provided marketplace.
  But now, as of last week, the real impacts are being felt as well by 
seniors across this country who in big numbers have been signing up for 
Medicare Advantage. Close to 30 percent of all Medicare recipients--15 
million seniors--as a result are going to see higher premiums and 
reduced access to health care because of the cuts that will occur to 
Medicare Advantage in order to pay for a new entitlement program, 
ObamaCare, which, based on the number of delays the administration has 
made, has already demonstrated it is not working. And I, as have many 
of my colleagues here, have argued for a long time that it can't work 
because it is built upon a faulty foundation.
  There is a much better way to do this. We should do away with this 
approach, go back to the drawing board, and use a step-by-step approach 
to reforming health care in this country, realizing the status quo 
doesn't work but realizing as well that the best way to get lower 
costs, more affordable health care, and more accessible health care for 
more American citizens is to create downward pressure on prices. That 
requires giving people choices and creating competition in the 
marketplace. Those are the things we ought to be advocating and 
advancing rather than this top-down, government-knows-best, one-size-
fits-all solution coming out of Washington, DC, which is hurting more 
and more Americans and most recently American citizens who are now 
experiencing the adverse impacts of

[[Page S1140]]

ObamaCare because of the cuts to their Medicare Advantage plans.
  Madam President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Heitkamp). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. AYOTTE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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