[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 105 (Tuesday, June 20, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3627-S3631]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Healthcare Legislation
Mr. UDALL. Mr. President, I am happy to be joined today on the floor
by Senator Heinrich, who has been a real fighter for healthcare for New
Mexicans, and I am looking forward to staying on the floor and hearing
him talk about how he feels about this Republican healthcare bill as
well.
I rise today for the third time this session to oppose plans by
President Trump and the Republicans to gut our healthcare system and to
throw millions of Americans off their health insurance.
On May 4 of this year, the day that House Republicans narrowly passed
their TrumpCare bill, the President held a celebration at the White
House in the Rose Garden and pronounced the bill a great plan.
Well, TrumpCare may be a great plan if you are wealthy and healthy,
because if you are wealthy you get big tax cuts and if you are healthy,
your premiums may not go up, and may even go down--that is, until you
are sick.
TrumpCare is not a great plan if you are over the age of 62, if you
are a hard-working family trying to make ends meet, if you live in a
rural area, if you have or have not had an illness like cancer or heart
disease or diabetes, or if you are a woman. Twenty-three million
Americans will be left high and dry--out of health insurance by 2026.
They don't think TrumpCare is a great plan. To them, it is a mean plan.
Actually, those were President Trump's own words several weeks after
the Rose Garden celebration. President Trump came clean with the Senate
Republicans, admonishing them that the bill is ``mean'' and needs to be
more ``generous, kind, and with heart.'' For the first time since his
inauguration, I agree with the President on healthcare.
Since day one of the 115th Congress, Republicans have had the
Affordable Care Act in their sights, and so has the President. They
have tried mightily to do away with the rights and benefits under the
ACA. But there is good news. The American people have rallied. They
have called, they have emailed, and they have gone to town halls. They
have marched, they have made their views known, and they have shared
their stories. So far, they have stopped Republicans from gutting our
healthcare system.
Just this past Saturday in my home State, simultaneous rallies in
opposition to TrumpCare took place in 20 counties. I say to them: Keep
up the fight, and I will continue to fight as hard as I can. We need to
do all we can to stop this attack on healthcare.
The consequences of upending our healthcare system are enormous. They
are enormous for the 20 million Americans who now have healthcare
because of the ACA through private insurance and through Medicaid
expansion. TrumpCare hurts the most vulnerable--the elderly, the
disabled, and those with fewer resources.
The consequences of gutting the ACA and restructuring Medicaid are
enormous for our economy, one-sixth of which is related to healthcare.
They are enormous for hospitals that rely on third-party reimbursements
under the ACA and Medicaid expansion. These hospitals need those
revenues, and even more so for rural hospitals that keep their doors
open thanks to the ACA, as well as the Indian Healthcare Service
facilities, which have reduced wait times and added services because of
the ACA.
But the majority in Congress refuses to hold hearings, and they are
blocking all public participation. This is unconscionable, and it is
undemocratic.
[[Page S3628]]
Before Democrats voted on ObamaCare, the Senate held 100 committee
hearings, roundtables, and walk-throughs. The final Senate bill
included 147 Republican amendments. The majority leader has missed an
opportunity for political and moral leadership on one of the most
important issues we face. Senator McConnell should have an honest and
open process, including Senate committee hearings, with full public
participation and a chance for patients to tell Congress how this
proposal impacts them--not hidden meanings, not limited debate and a
simple majority vote.
Americans deserve an open process from their elected leaders. That is
why I introduced a bill last week with my Democratic colleagues called
the No Hearing, No Vote Act. This bill would require a public committee
hearing for any legislation that goes through the fast-track budget
reconciliation process, including the TrumpCare legislation.
Members of Congress were elected to improve lives, not destroy them,
and I believe we need bipartisan cooperation to ensure we don't do
that.
If we wanted to improve on ObamaCare, we could: No 1, make sure that
all Americans have healthcare; and No. 2, make healthcare more
affordable.
So I will tell my colleagues what is really happening here. The
American people don't want the benefits they have gained through
ObamaCare to be repealed and replaced with an inferior plan. They do
not support TrumpCare. Only 17 percent of Americans support the House
Republicans' current bill. With this degree of public opposition, it is
baffling that Republicans keep pushing the bill that kicks 23 million
Americans off their healthcare.
But the moral underpinnings of TrumpCare are as bankrupt as Trump's
New Jersey casinos. The winners of TrumpCare are the wealthy, and the
Republicans are plainly serving those interests. The Republicans can
keep trying to hide TrumpCare, but Americans understand that it is just
plain wrong.
I want to talk about a few of the ways that it is just plain wrong.
While women make up half of our population, no women serve on Senator
McConnell's healthcare working group. Yet women are uniquely affected
by TrumpCare. For example, the range of cost-free preventive services
under the Affordable Care Act includes screenings for breast cancer,
including mammograms, bone density screenings, cervical cancer
screenings, domestic violence screenings and counseling, breast feeding
counseling and equipment, contraception, and folic acid supplements.
All of these services were critical to maintaining women's health and
the health of their babies as well.
New Mexico leads the Nation in the percentage of births that are
covered by Medicaid at 72 percent of all births in the State. So these
services that are now available to every woman are essential.
TrumpCare would repeal the cost-free preventive care requirements for
the Medicaid expansion population. Not only would this repeal risk the
health of women and their babies, but it would result in increased
medical care costs overall. Preventive medical services save money in
the long run.
The Affordable Care Act requires insurance plans to provide a range
of essential health benefits. For women, these required services
include maternity and newborn child care. But TrumpCare would allow
States to apply for a waiver to define their own essential health
benefits beginning in 2020. So States could choose to exclude maternity
and newborn care, and women would end up paying more for this care. The
result is women not getting the care they need.
TrumpCare would cut Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood for 1
year. Planned Parenthood provides preventive medical and reproductive
health services to women and men, and Planned Parenthood funding
provides a safety net to low-income women. According to the CBO,
cutting off Medicaid payments to Planned Parenthood for 1 year would
mean a total loss of access to services in some low-income communities
because Planned Parenthood is the only public provider in some regions.
Take Elena from Albuquerque, NM. When she was 30 years old and in law
school, Elena found out that she had the BRCA gene mutation, which puts
her at a much higher risk for breast and ovarian cancer. The treatments
for the BRCA gene mutation include a mastectomy and ovary removal--
treatments she couldn't afford.
Thankfully, Elena qualified for Medicaid under the expansion. She got
her breast cancer screenings and decided to have a mastectomy because
of the cancer scare. Elena had three surgeries, costing thousands of
dollars, covered by Medicaid, and now the chances of her getting breast
cancer are very low. But Elena now worries that if she decides to have
her ovaries removed and TrumpCare becomes law, she will not be able to
have this potentially lifesaving surgery. If she has had a lapse in
Medicaid coverage, her Medicaid expansion coverage will be gone, and
because TrumpCare would end the ban against insurance companies denying
coverage for people with preexisting conditions, she may never be able
to get insurance or surgery.
Public schools and schoolchildren will be hurt by TrumpCare. Schools
are now eligible to receive Medicaid funds for necessary medical
services for children with disabilities. Schools are reimbursed for
vision, hearing, and mental health screenings. These services help
children get services early so they can be ready to learn.
Right now, New Mexico schools are reimbursed $18 million from
Medicaid, but under TrumpCare, States would not have to consider
schools' Medicaid-eligible providers, and the costs would be on the
public schools. The problem is, New Mexico public schools cannot take
on these kinds of costs. That might mean hundreds of schoolchildren
each year will go without vision, hearing, and mental health treatment
because no one else will be able to provide them.
Dr. Lynn McIlroy, superintendent of the Loving Municipal Schools, a
rural school district in Southeastern New Mexico, said:
Medicaid funding is vital to our continuum of care and
service to the majority of our students. Often, our school
nurse is the only medical professional our students ever see.
New Mexico has one of the highest percent Native American populations
in the country, more than 10 percent of our residents. Even though many
Native Americans receive healthcare through the Indian Health Service,
IHS has not always been able to provide needed care due to a lack of
funding. Medicaid expansion has changed that and changed that
dramatically.
Dr. Valory Wangler, who works with the Zuni Pueblo, says: Since the
Affordable Care Act, patients of Zuni have access to special services
that were once difficult to fund and often delayed or denied.
An IHS physician working on the Zuni Reservation had a patient with
severe arthritis that was making it difficult for her to stay
physically active and work at a local school. She needed knee
replacement surgery. Before Medicaid expansion, IHS had trouble funding
knee replacements, and the surgery was denied for years because IHS
could only afford to pay for life and loss of limb services. This
patient is now on the Medicaid expansion. She was able to get a total
knee replacement, is working full time, staying fit, and is no longer
in pain.
One of the ACA's most popular provisions is the protection from
discrimination if you have a preexisting condition. This is one of the
most mystifying parts of TrumpCare. Republicans would end that
protection by allowing States to waive out and set up high-risk pools.
All of us know someone with a serious illness or condition, like Kitt
here. Kitt is 4\1/2\ years old and has type I diabetes that will
require lifelong care. Her mother Dana is worried about TrumpCare. Dana
says: It breaks my heart that elected officials are leaning toward
dropping the Federal mandate to guarantee affordable health insurance
for those with preexisting conditions. Sit down with a child who has an
unbearable disease and be their warrior in DC to make everything
possible for that special soul and their family to have an easier
tomorrow.
I hope we will all be those warriors to protect that healthcare
program which has been put in place for them.
I yield to Senator Heinrich.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
[[Page S3629]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. HEINRICH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. HEINRICH. Mr. President, I want to start by thanking my colleague
from New Mexico, Senator Udall, for his advocacy on behalf of the
pieces and parts of our healthcare system that are so important to the
State of New Mexico. Things like rural hospitals, opioid treatment,
Indian Country, he has been an incredible champion on those. That is
part of the reason why both of us come to the floor today, given what
is at stake.
Last month, President Trump and House Republicans rushed through a
disastrous healthcare bill that would leave average New Mexico families
paying thousands of dollars more for less healthcare coverage. It would
destroy the Medicaid Program as it currently exists in our State and
throw our entire healthcare system into chaos. Now Senate Republicans
are drafting their own version of a similar healthcare bill in complete
secret, behind closed doors, with absolutely no--none--bipartisan
input.
This lack of transparency and departure from regular order is
unacceptable and deeply irresponsible, especially when every single
American family's healthcare coverage is at stake if this bill ever
becomes law.
While we don't know for sure what the Senate Republicans' version of
TrumpCare will look like, media reports say it is shaping up to look
more and more like the train wreck of a bill that President Trump and
House Republicans celebrated in the White House Rose Garden just a
couple months ago, a bill President Trump reportedly said in another
closed-door meeting with Republican Senators last week was, in his
words, ``mean'' and cold-hearted.
The House-passed TrumpCare bill is devastating to low-income
families, to seniors, to Americans living with preexisting conditions.
This isn't so much a healthcare bill as it is a tax cut for the
ultrarich masquerading as healthcare reform. You don't have to take my
word for it. You can look at how the nonpartisan Congressional Budget
Office described its projected impacts of the House-passed TrumpCare
bill.
According to the CBO's analysis, TrumpCare would strip 14 million of
their health insurance next year and 23 million by 2026, all to give
tax breaks to the wealthiest of Americans. That is reckless, and
frankly it is inexcusable by any measure.
How would the bill do that? The House-passed bill, which again seems
to be the baseline for the ongoing secret negotiations here in the
Senate, would slash funding for the Medicaid Program by hundreds of
billions of dollars and end the need-based tax credits for individual
healthcare market plans under the ACA.
I have heard from so many New Mexicans who have told me how access to
healthcare coverage has helped their families and, in some cases, even
saved their lives.
I recently met with patients at the Ben Archer Health Center, a rural
health clinic in Hatch, NM, and heard firsthand how important Medicaid
coverage can be to families in Southern New Mexico. One of the New
Mexicans I met there was Anna Marie, a Las Cruces native who worked for
the Las Cruces public food service for 22 years.
Anna Marie's husband passed away in 2008, and when she found herself
unable to keep working following a minor stroke, she could not afford
healthcare coverage on her own. When she reached out to my office last
year, she had bronchitis and walking pneumonia. My staff helped her
enroll in Medicaid, and now she is able to get access to the care she
needs.
I want to take a moment to explain why the Medicaid Program is so
critical in my home State of New Mexico. As a Medicaid expansion State,
New Mexico has seen dramatic gains over the last 5 years in coverage
for the folks who need it the most. Stories like Anna Marie's
illustrate just how important Medicaid can be for hard-working New
Mexicans.
Medicaid currently provides affordable healthcare coverage to over
900,000 New Mexicans, including many schoolchildren, seniors in nursing
homes and long-term care facilities, people with disabilities, and
people who need treatment for mental health and addiction.
Just one example of the wide-ranging consequences of the Republican
healthcare plan's drastic cuts to the Medicaid Program would be the end
to any possible progress we have made so far in fighting the opioid and
heroin epidemic. The opioid addiction epidemic has been deeply felt in
communities across the State of New Mexico. For years, without adequate
treatment resources, our State has suffered through some of the highest
rates of opioid and heroin addiction in the Nation.
I would just note that today a story came out about how we
hospitalized in the ER long-term care or hospital care 1.3 million
Americans last year because of this epidemic. However, when provided
with an opportunity to receive comprehensive treatment and
rehabilitation, people who have suffered through the trials of opioid
addiction can and do turn their lives around.
Evidence-based treatment works, but it is only possible when we
devote real resources to pay for it. So much of that comes directly
through the Medicaid Program. As we can see on this chart, Medicaid
pays for 30 percent of opioid medication-assisted treatment in New
Mexico--30 percent. It is the foundation to build on for opioid
treatment.
In States like West Virginia, Ohio, and Kentucky, Medicaid pays for
nearly half of opioid treatment payments. This came up just last Friday
when the White House hosted its first meeting for President Trump's
Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis. The
President's top advisers probably didn't hear what they would have
liked to from the advocates who have been on the front lines of
fighting the growing opioid crisis.
For example, Dr. Joe Parks, the medical director for the National
Council for Behavioral Health, told the President's Commission:
Medicaid is the largest national payer for addiction and
mental health treatment. Since the majority of increased
opiate deaths and suicide occur in young and middle-aged
adults, which is the Medicaid expansion population, the
Medicaid expansions must be maintained and completed.
It is nothing short of hypocrisy for the Trump White House to claim
it is taking steps to address the opioid epidemic when it is helping
Republicans in Congress push through legislation that would end the
Medicaid Program as we know it. Slashing hundreds of billions of
dollars in Federal funding from the Medicaid Program will ultimately
pass all of those costs on to the States. Let me give a sense for just
how big a burden that would be.
In New Mexico, it is estimated that our State government would have
to either come up with a way to raise $11 billion of new taxes over the
next decade or cut the equivalent amount of coverage for the hundreds
of thousands of New Mexicans who rely on the program. That is a hit to
the State budget of 1 billion-plus dollars a year. This would have an
especially hard impact on our State's rural communities.
When you go to small towns in New Mexico, like Clayton, Raton, and
Santa Rosa, as I did last fall on a rural healthcare listening tour,
you see right away the vital role hospitals play in rural communities.
In most cases, these hospitals are the only healthcare providers for
many miles in any direction.
Hospitals are also often the major employer in these small towns.
Rural healthcare providers face enormous challenges because it is
financially difficult to provide care to populations that live over
vast spaces and are, on average, older, less affluent, and more prone
to chronic diseases than those in more urban and suburban communities.
Medicaid expansion and the need-based tax credits for individual
healthcare market plans in the ACA have been critical financial
lifelines for rural healthcare providers. Thanks to the coverage gains
we have seen in New Mexico, instead of seeing uninsured patients coming
to the emergency room during expensive medical emergencies, our rural
healthcare providers are able to help New Mexicans live healthier lives
with primary care and a preventive medicine approach.
[[Page S3630]]
When medical emergencies do arise, New Mexicans have coverage that
helps rural healthcare providers cover those expenses. If President
Trump and Republicans in the Senate pass their healthcare bill, all of
that could go away, and some of our rural healthcare providers may very
well have to close up shop.
Right now, more than one-third of rural hospitals are already at risk
of closure. If you look at where the hospitals that have been forced to
shut down in recent years are located, they are almost all in States
that chose not to expand Medicaid. We should learn a lesson from that.
I know for a fact that if hospitals shut down, healthcare delivery in
rural New Mexico would be decimated and economic impact would be severe
in these small towns. It is estimated that when a single hospital
closes in a small rural community, nearly 100 jobs are lost, taking
more than $5 million directly out of the local economy.
A recent report by the Economic Policy Institute estimates that if
Congress passes TrumpCare into law, New Mexico alone would see a loss
of almost 50,000 jobs by the year 2022. Thanks in large part to the
major coverage gains that we have seen under the ACA, the healthcare
sector has been New Mexico's strongest area of job growth for the last
5 years. New Mexico added over 4,000 healthcare jobs in 2015 alone.
A couple of months ago, I met with students at Central New Mexico
Community College, CNM, in Albuquerque, who were training for those
healthcare jobs. These bright young people want to make careers out of
making their communities healthier and safer. With this dangerous
legislation moving through Washington, they are all worried about what
it might mean for their future career plans.
Why would we want to rip the rug out from under them by wreaking
havoc on the Nation's healthcare system? Again, you really have to ask
yourself why Republicans are so intent on rushing through a massive
piece of legislation before we can even understand its potential
harmful consequences.
As I said earlier, I have heard from literally thousands of New
Mexicans who have called in or written or come up to me on the street
to oppose this legislation. Many of them have told me how it will
directly impact their families. I could pick any one of these stories
to demonstrate what is at stake in this debate, but I will leave you
with just one.
Brittany, from Aztec, NM, wrote me about her two young children who
were diagnosed with a rare form of food allergies that created
absolutely unaffordable costs through her husband's employer-provided
healthcare plan.
Brittany said that she and her husband were averaging three doctors'
visits a week and were ``barely keeping [their] heads above water just
from paying co-pays.''
After applying for Medicaid, she and her husband have full coverage
for their children's medical costs. Brittany wrote to me and said:
For us Medicaid is literally lifesaving. Please do not take
away this program or any of the ACA! It may not be perfect
and could use some work, but taking it away altogether would
be catastrophic for so many people like my family.
That is what she wrote to me.
I want to urge President Trump and I certainly want to urge my
Republican colleagues in the Senate to listen to that urgent message.
It is time to turn the page on the disastrous policy path that is
``repeal and replace'' so we can finally get to work on actually fixing
those things in the current healthcare system that we all agree need
work.
Our common goal--regardless of whether we are Republicans or
Democrats--that we should all be working toward is making quality
healthcare more accessible, more affordable for all Americans.
I would welcome a good-faith effort to tackle that challenge because
healthcare policies shouldn't be a political football. It should be
about giving peace of mind to the millions of Americans like Anna Marie
in Las Cruces, like Brittany in Aztec, who are only one diagnosis away
from a crisis if we don't get this right.
I reserve the remainder of my time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
Ms. DUCKWORTH. Mr. President, over the past few years, the Affordable
Care Act has made tremendous strides in expanding healthcare coverage
for hard-working Americans and the families who need it. I thank my
colleague for his stories, and I would like to add some of my own.
While the law could certainly be improved, the way to do it is not by
passing TrumpCare, which even President Trump has admitted is a
``mean'' bill. Unfortunately, Republican Senate leadership has
indicated whatever it is that the Republicans are crafting in secret,
behind closed doors, is going to be very similar to the version of
TrumpCare that has passed the House. That is simply bad news.
The version of TrumpCare that passed the House could cost 23 million
Americans, including 385,000 Illinoisans, to lose healthcare coverage.
It would make it more expensive for older Americans and working people,
especially those with preexisting conditions, to purchase insurance.
TrumpCare would cause their premiums and their out-of-pocket costs to
simply skyrocket. The premiums of the average Illinoisan would increase
by $700.
TrumpCare would also make critical services like maternity care for
new moms and mental health and substance abuse services significantly
more expensive, even though they are desperately needed. That is
extremely mean-spirited.
Making matters worse, it would also put veterans on the chopping
block. Specifically, TrumpCare would prohibit veterans who are eligible
for VA healthcare from receiving tax credits to help them afford
insurance in the individual marketplace. However, there is a big
difference between being eligible for VA healthcare and being enrolled
in VA. Oftentimes, that is not even a choice you can make.
According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, as many as
7 million of our veterans are eligible for VA care but are not
enrolled. Preventing them from receiving tax credits would amount to a
massive tax hike that would force them to pay thousands of dollars
extra each year. That is not just mean; it is unacceptable.
There has been ample reporting indicating that Republicans knew
exactly what they were doing. They could have included a fix to this
but purposefully did not because that would have made their bill
ineligible to be considered under the Senate's budget reconciliation
process, which requires only 51 votes. That is because to remedy this
huge flaw, the veterans tax credit language would need to be considered
in committees of jurisdiction. That would entail holding public
hearings and markups in committees, which would then reveal to the
American people what exactly is in the Republican bill.
Apparently, the cost of public scrutiny is too high for Senate
Republican leaders who are willing to raise taxes on veterans so they
can hide this bad bill from the American people. As a result, the
appalling flaws in their bill remain unfixed, and up to 7 million
veterans remain on the chopping block.
That is not the only way TrumpCare would harm veterans either. Its
massive cuts to Medicaid would have a direct impact on veterans, since
nearly 2 million veterans across our country, including 60,000 veterans
in my own home State of Illinois, rely on Medicaid for their healthcare
coverage. That is 1 in 10 veterans.
For nearly 1 million of these veterans, Medicaid is their only source
of coverage. Many of them are eligible for VA care only for the
injuries they sustained in the military but not for any of their other
health needs.
I shouldn't have to remind my colleagues that veterans are at a
higher risk for serious health issues because of the sacrifices they
made for our Nation. Yet, if TrumpCare becomes law, many of them will
lose the coverage they gained from Medicaid expansion under the ACA.
Right now, 13 Republican Senators are sitting behind closed doors in
some secret room on Capitol Hill, gambling with the lives of millions
of Americans and people who have honorably served their country. One of
those lives belongs to Robin Schmidt, a veteran from the North Side of
Chicago.
Robin served during Desert Storm in Army military intelligence. Robin
loved her job in the military because it had always been her dream to
serve her country. As a 13-year-old girl, Robin
[[Page S3631]]
stood at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, DC. She knew
that serving her country was her true calling. However, she was
eventually forced to end her military career because, in her words,
``the Army refused to allow my husband to come back overseas to live
with me.''
When she was pregnant with her child, she was forced to leave the
military in order to return home to Arkansas to be with her husband to
raise their children. When she was stateside, the VA denied her
benefits because they were not service-connected, thus forcing her and
her husband to pay the costs of maternity care and childbirth out of
pocket.
She faced medical complications and developed endometriosis, a
preexisting condition, and had to have a Caesarean section during
delivery. After she delivered her baby, she ended up with $500,000 in
hospital debt.
This enormous debt followed Robin and her husband throughout their
marriage, and it eventually left them in divorce, medical bankruptcy,
and with all of the repercussions that come from extreme financial
hardship. She was also blocked from accessing affordable healthcare
coverage because she now had a preexisting condition and could not
afford good coverage on an $8.50-an-hour wage, so she went without
care.
Robin remained uninsured for a total of 22 years, until she remarried
and gained healthcare coverage under her husband's insurance. This was
especially devastating because in 2007, Robin was diagnosed with
cancer. Even though Robin was covered by her husband's insurance,
insurance companies were not required to cover chemotherapy in 2007,
and chemotherapy was too expensive for Robin and her family to pay for
out of pocket. Instead, she had to choose debilitating surgeries.
After her cancer diagnosis, Robin developed severe autoimmune
arthritis. Her autoimmune treatments started at $5,000 a month and soon
increased to $14,000 a month. Insurance companies wanted Robin to pay
for her medication upfront, with no guarantee of reimbursement.
As her medical costs grew and grew, Robin had to choose between her
medical care and her mortgage payment. After the Affordable Care Act
became law, insurance companies were mandated to cover Robin's
medications and treatments. They were no longer able to refuse her the
medications she needed. Her insurance premium prior to the Affordable
Care Act was $1,600 a month, which was more than her family paid for
their monthly mortgage and household bills. Now she pays just $300 a
month for her entire family. There was no more redtape, constant
stress, or fear that she might not be able to work--or worse, might not
be able to stay alive.
Unfortunately, the coverage, relief, and peace of mind the ACA
brought to Robin and her family is now under attack by congressional
Republicans. Robin is afraid that if TrumpCare becomes law, she will
once again become nothing more than an uninsurable preexisting
condition. She is afraid she would be considered a high-risk pool
patient who will be able to have insurance but will not be able to
actually afford any of her treatments. She is afraid that if
Republicans push through TrumpCare, she will not be able to walk, work,
and will have absolutely no quality of life.
Her dream was to serve her country in our Armed Forces. She took two
oaths to serve this country, and she kept those oaths--promises that
she would defend this great Nation.
Robin may not be in uniform anymore, but she certainly deserves that
we in Congress and here in the Senate defend her right to access
quality healthcare.
For Robin and for nearly 7 million veterans, middle-class families,
our seniors, and some of our most vulnerable Americans, I urge my
Republican counterparts to stop these secret negotiations, take repeal
off the table, and work with Democrats to improve our healthcare
system. Just like Robin, each of these Americans has a story, a family,
and a valued place in society. Robin's family and all Americans deserve
better than having their coverage stripped away from them behind closed
doors.
I yield back.