[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believe strongly it needs to be repealed.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.
____________________