[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 121 (Thursday, July 18, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4929-S4930]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                               Healthcare

  Mr. MURPHY. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to ask my 
colleagues a simple question. There is a lawsuit that is proceeding 
through the court system right now that has succeeded the district 
court level, that has had a hearing at the appellate court level, and 
may be speeding toward the Supreme Court. It is a lawsuit that was 
brought by 20 Republican attorneys general. It is a lawsuit that is 
being supported by the Trump administration. It is a lawsuit that many 
of my colleagues have gone on record saying they support. It is a 
lawsuit to undo the entirety of the Affordable Care Act, to throw out 
insurance for 20 million Americans and to end protections for people 
with preexisting conditions. It is an attempt to do through the court 
system what this Congress refused to do, which is to obliterate the 
Affordable Care Act and all the insurance it provides for people 
without any plan for what comes next.
  I have served in both the House and the Senate, and I listened for a 
long time to my Republican colleagues say that while they don't like 
the Affordable Care Act, they certainly understand that there has to be 
something else, and that something else should be just as good as the 
Affordable Care Act. In fact, the President himself said that whatever 
plan he supported in substitute of the Affordable Care Act would have 
better insurance, cheaper insurance, and would insure more people.
  Republicans never came up with that plan. In fact, the replacement 
they jammed through the House of Representatives in 2017 was much worse 
than the Affordable Care Act. The Congressional Budget Office said that 
24 million people would lose insurance because of that piece of 
legislation and rates would potentially skyrocket for people with 
preexisting conditions.
  There has never been a replacement for the Affordable Care Act. The 
only plan from the beginning has been to repeal it. Now that Congress 
has said it won't repeal the Affordable Care Act--why? because 
Americans do not want the Affordable Care Act repealed with nothing to 
replace it--now that Congress won't do it because the American people 
don't support the repeal of the protections for sick people in the 
Affordable Care Act, Republicans are trying to get the courts to do it.
  We are perhaps 60 days away from the Sixth Circuit invalidating the 
entirety of the Affordable Care Act. Likely, if that is the case, the 
judgment will ultimately be rendered by the Supreme Court. But that 
could come as soon as the beginning of next year. We could still be 
months away from a humanitarian catastrophe in this country in which 
the entirety of the Affordable Care Act is invalidated and what to do 
about it is put back before Congress.

[[Page S4930]]

  It would stand to reason that if your plan is to try to get the 
entire Affordable Care Act thrown out in Congress, you would maybe 
start thinking about what would replace it. As far as I can tell, 
Republicans have no plan for what happens if the Affordable Care Act is 
overturned. As far as I can tell, my Republican colleagues have spent 
no time thinking about what would happen if they actually end up 
catching the car they have been chasing.
  What happens if the lawsuit succeeds? What happens if the Affordable 
Care Act is struck down? What comes next? We can't accept--and I don't 
think my Republican colleagues would want to accept--millions of people 
losing coverage overnight or insurance companies being able to 
discriminate against you because your child has a history of cancer or 
an insurance company being able to go back to capping the amount of 
insurance you get on an annual or lifetime basis.
  It is mere fantasy to think that we can reproduce the protections in 
the Affordable Care Act if we are not talking about it ahead of time.
  I am coming back on the floor today, as I have several times in the 
last few months, to ask my Republican colleagues to either withdraw 
your support for this lawsuit, stop the administration from being able 
to pursue it in court, or start a serious discussion about how you are 
going to protect care for everyone who has it today--not a handful of 
people who have it today but all the people who have it today--while 
this lawsuit is moving through the system.
  My Republican colleagues have been queried as to whether they support 
this lawsuit. The answers are all over the map, which tells you once 
again that nobody on the Republican side has really thought this one 
through.
  One Republican Senator says: I actually don't think the courts are 
eventually ever going to strike it down.
  Another says: I am ready for the lawsuit to succeed. I would love to 
go back in and actually deal with healthcare again.
  Another one says: Do I hope the lawsuit succeeds? I do.
  Another says: I can't say I hope it succeeds. I think the strategy 
from here on that I have adopted in my own mind is repair.
  Another says: My hope and belief is we won't strike the law down.
  The answers are all over the map. That is fine. The Republicans can 
have a varied set of opinions on whether the lawsuit should succeed, 
but none of those individuals who are quoted giving various opinions as 
to whether they would like the lawsuit to succeed have a concrete plan 
for what comes next.
  Let's just be honest. It is mere fantasy to think that a divided 
Congress is going to be able to, in an emergency, come up with a plan 
to keep 20 million people insured and keep preexisting conditions 
protections for the 133 million Americans who depend on them. We can't 
pass a budget through Congress. We have trouble passing a Higher 
Education Act reauthorization or the Violence Against Women Act. How on 
Earth are we going to pass a reordering of the American healthcare 
system when it is blown to bits by a Supreme Court decision that no one 
is ready for?
  That is why I am down on the floor today. I am going to keep on 
bringing this up because I just can't accept this world in which we 
live today in which half of this Chamber is just sort of boxing their 
ears and closing their eyes to this legal strategy. If it succeeds, as 
many Republicans hope it does, all we are going to be talking about 
here is healthcare. Overnight, we will be consumed by this topic, and 
we will not be able to come up with a solution that involves the same 
amount of protections that exist today.
  Why repeal it? Why not continue to work on making the system better 
without holding hostage all of the Americans who rely on it today? That 
is a much better path of action. Keep the Affordable Care Act in place. 
Work together on ways that we can fix the existing healthcare system. 
Don't create a chaotic situation with the wholesale repeal of the 
entire act, putting lives in jeopardy.
  There is no plan on behalf of the Republicans as to what to do if the 
ACA is overturned. I feel that we need to remind the country of that 
over and over again.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas.