[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 117 (Wednesday, July 12, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3934-S3935]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
HEALTHCARE LEGISLATION
Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, yesterday my friend the majority leader
announced he would be extending this work period by 2 weeks so the
Republicans can have more time to finish their healthcare bill. With
all due respect, time is not the issue. Two more weeks will not help
Republicans fix this bill. Remember, the Republican leadership told
everyone they would vote on the bill before July 4. Two weeks have gone
by, and they don't seem any closer to having a bill that would actually
improve healthcare in America. They seem even further away.
When you have a rotten product, time is not on your side. The longer
you wait, the more people know about it, the fewer people like it, the
less popular it is, and the harder it is to pass it. I don't even have
to tell my good friend the leader that. He knows it.
I know why our colleagues are not so unhappy about what the leader
said. We know why our Republican colleagues don't want to go home. They
don't want to face the wrath of their constituents. If I were a
Republican, I wouldn't want to go home either. I wouldn't want to face
my constituents and try to defend this deeply unpopular and damaging
bill.
Now, the most significant change proposed to their legislation over
the course of 2 weeks is an amendment by the junior Senator from Texas
that would actually make the bill worse. By allowing insurers to sell
cutrate plans that cover very few services, the Cruz amendment creates
a very dangerous bait and switch. The bait is that the premiums would
come down for a bit for some because insurance will not have to cover
very much, and the switch is that deductibles and copays go way up to
make up even more than the difference. Under the Cruz amendment, you
could be paying a monthly premium for a healthcare insurance plan so
threadbare, with a deductible so high that you will not get any
benefit. For many, a Cruz policy could be worse than none at all. The
Cruz policy leads to junk insurance, something nobody really wants,
except maybe a few insurance companies.
Ironically, the Cruz amendment would cause exactly the kind of death
spiral my Republican friends keep talking about. A group of patient
advocates, including the AARP, the Cancer Action Network, and the
American Heart Association--these are hardly political groups; these
are patient advocates--said that if the Cruz amendment passed,
``younger and healthier individuals would be allowed to purchase non-
ACA compliant plans that have lower premiums but fewer benefits.''
Without the younger, healthier people in the risk pool, the
premiums for ACA-compliant plans would rise quickly and
significantly. This same kind of risk pool segmentation
occurred prior to the enactment of the ACA when 35 states
operated high-risk pools . . . In that experience, most of
those states . . . were forced to limit enrollment, reduce
benefits, create waiting lists, and raise premiums and out-
of-pocket costs to the point of unaffordability. Millions of
patients lacked access to care and treatment.
That is not Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, talking. That is the
AARP, the Cancer Action Network, and the American Heart Association.
Again, those groups said about the Cruz plan that it would ``limit
enrollment, reduce benefits, create waiting lists, and raise premiums
and out-of-pocket costs to the point of unaffordability,'' because the
Cruz plan is very similar to what we had before the ACA. Even the
conservative American Action Forum said the Cruz amendment is ``the
definition of a death spiral.'' Higher costs, less care, waiting lists,
death spirals--that is the Cruz amendment in a nutshell. How many are
going to vote for that?
That is the most significant change Republicans came up with after an
extra 2 weeks on the bill. Imagine, if they have another 2 weeks, what
they will come up with.
My friends on the other side of the aisle should have no illusions.
They can't distract our attention from this bill by phony complaints
over nominations or any other issue. More time is not going to solve
their problem on healthcare. It is much deeper than that. The problem
is the substance of
[[Page S3935]]
the bill, which so cruelly exchanges healthcare for working Americans
for a massive tax cut for the very wealthy.
The idea is so backward that the American people have revolted
against this legislation. Even in the deeply conservative parts of my
State, where I have met with my constituents, there is a revulsion to
this bill. I am not surprised that some polls say that only 12 percent
of Americans support it.
There is no fixing a bill as broken as this one. There is no tweaking
a bill as fundamentally flawed as this one. An amended bill that only
kicks 15 or 17 or 20 million Americans off their insurance, though less
than the last CBO estimate, would still be a moral travesty. An amended
bill that gives a slightly smaller tax break to the wealthy while still
cutting Medicaid to the bone would still be gravely worse than the
status quo. The only answer for my Republican friends is simple: Start
over. Abandon cuts to Medicaid, abandon tax breaks for the wealthy, and
abandon this one-party approach.
Democrats want to work with our Republican colleagues to actually
improve our healthcare system, and, it turns out, that is what the
American people want as well.
The Kaiser Family Foundation found that 71 percent of Americans favor
a bipartisan effort to improve our healthcare system, as opposed to the
Republican's partisan effort. That is, again, that 71 percent favor a
bipartisan effort--72 percent of Independents and even 46 percent of
Trump supporters.
When will my Republican colleagues start listening to the American
people? Start over, drop this partisan process and this devastating
bill, and work with us. We are willing to stay 2 weeks, 2 months, or 2
years to get a good healthcare bill for the American people, but we
should be included in the process.
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