[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 90 (Wednesday, June 11, 2014)]
[House]
[Page H5251]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 NO SUBSIDIES WITHOUT VERIFICATION ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
Tennessee (Mrs. Black) for 5 minutes.
  Mrs. BLACK. Mr. Speaker, more than 1 million Americans who signed up 
for health care on the Federal ObamaCare exchange may be receiving an 
incorrect taxpayer subsidy for their plan due to the fact that the 
Obama administration pushed this law through before the systems were in 
place to accurately confirm eligibility.
  This isn't mere incompetence on the part of the White House; no, this 
is a direct result of the administration's insistence on moving forward 
with their arbitrary October 1, 2013, open enrollment date, regardless 
of the consequences.
  Consider the problem this presents as there is currently no realtime 
system in place to ensure only those who qualify for subsidies receive 
them. This means that hardworking American taxpayers may be left on the 
hook for potentially billions of dollars in fraudulent subsidy 
payments. Furthermore, it means that someone who simply fills out their 
ObamaCare enrollment application incorrectly could be hounded for years 
by the Internal Revenue Service for back taxes owed on improper 
payments.
  This problem was entirely preventable. That is why, in the wake of 
the clandestine holiday rules change that delayed income verification 
provisions in ObamaCare last summer, I introduced legislation that 
would have prevented any ObamaCare subsidies from being doled out until 
a system was in place to make sure that only those who were determined 
eligible would receive them. The House acted on this legislation, 
passing it in a bipartisan vote last September to help protect the 
American taxpayers from rampant fraud and abuse.
  Unfortunately, instead of giving my bill the consideration that it 
deserved, the Senate stripped the verification provision contained in 
the bill and replaced it with language requiring a mere report to 
Congress by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius at 
the end of last year, certifying that there is a system in place to 
verify incomes before subsidies are paid out.
  Predictably, this weakened income verification language has failed, 
and we have now learned from news reports that over 1 million Americans 
are potentially receiving an amount in error. That is why I have now 
introduced H.R. 4805, the No Subsidies Without Verification Act of 
2014.
  The tax credits and cost-sharing assistance for ObamaCare premiums 
administered by HHS is estimated to amount to a staggering $10 billion 
per month, making this one of the largest entitlement programs in the 
Nation. My bill would simply require an income verification system to 
be put into place before any additional taxpayer subsidies are given 
out.
  Mr. Speaker, ObamaCare has become such a boondoggle that the 
nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office can't even score it anymore. My 
commonsense legislation would slow the bleeding this law is having on 
American taxpayers, and I look forward to working with my colleagues to 
move it forward.

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