[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 16965-16966]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               OBAMACARE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Louisiana (Mr. Scalise) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SCALISE. Madam Speaker, we all have heard the promise over and 
over again:

       If you like what you have, you can keep it.

  It is probably the most often repeated promise since Barack Obama has 
been President. For 5 years now, that promise has been made, and 
unfortunately, now millions of Americans are realizing that that 
promise has been broken over and over again. Over 100,000 Louisiana 
families are seeing that broken promise.
  In fact, we had a social media site called Share with Steve where we 
asked people in Louisiana's First Congressional District to share their 
stories with me, and the stories that I have heard have been compelling 
and heartbreaking. In fact, I started sharing some of those stories 
with the Secretary of Health and Human Services. When Secretary 
Sebelius was before us in the House Energy and Commerce Committee just 
a little over a week ago, I shared some of those stories with her.
  One of those stories was Shaun from Covington, and I read Shaun's 
story of the health care that he has now lost for his family because of 
the President's health care law. Of course, you have got Secretary 
Sebelius who is running the President's health care law and all of 
these broken promises that we are hearing about. I said, What would you 
tell Shaun, Madam Secretary, who has now lost the good health care he 
has for his family when you promised him that he would be able to keep 
that health care?

                              {time}  1030

  Unfortunately, all we got was a smug response from a bureaucrat in 
Washington, and her response to Shaun was, Well, you can just go shop 
around in the health care exchange.
  Well, first of all, that is not the promise that she and the 
President made to Shaun. The President promised Shaun he could keep his 
health care if he liked it. And Shaun likes his health care and doesn't 
want to lose it and, even more, doesn't want to have to go to some Web 
site that doesn't even work to go buy a plan that his family doesn't 
need. What Shaun conveyed to me after that interaction with the 
Secretary was that what he is being presented now are options that are 
even more expensive and don't include the kind of coverage that his 
family wants.
  So I think what is most insulting to Americans is not only now that 
they are losing that health care, that President Obama broke that 
promise, that sacred promise between a doctor and a patient, but now 
you are hearing this elitist Washington politician response where you 
have got these bureaucrats and politicians in Washington telling people 
like Shaun, We didn't think your plan was good enough.
  So not only have they broken the promise, but now they are deciding 
what they think is good enough for a patient and their doctor. And so a 
family in a place like Covington, Louisiana, that I represent, or all 
around the country, that had good health insurance, that liked the plan 
that they had, is being told not only that they can't keep it, but that 
some Washington bureaucrat didn't think their plan was good enough, 
even though they thought their plan was good enough.
  So this is what is wrong with government-run health care. This is why 
we fought this bill back in 2009 when it was going through the Energy 
and Commerce Committee and here on the House floor when you had then-
Speaker Nancy Pelosi saying you have got to pass the bill to find out 
what is in it. Of course American families are now seeing what is in 
it, and they don't like what they are seeing in this bill.
  Later this week, we are bringing up a bill on the House floor that I 
am proud to cosponsor that allows you to keep the plan that you have if 
you like it. Of course, the President's promise really should have been 
if Barack Obama likes your plan you can keep it, because that is the 
only way you can keep your plan is if the Federal Government approves 
of it even if you like it and you lose it.
  What we are also seeing, of course, over on the Senate side, and even 
here on the House floor, many people who voted for the President's 
health care law are acting as if they had no idea this was going to 
happen. Of course

[[Page 16966]]

they knew this was going to happen. If you read the bill, you could 
tell that people would lose the good health care they liked. There were 
reports coming out in 2010 that said millions of Americans will lose 
the health care they like, and yet now you have Senators over there and 
even some House Members who voted for the President's health care law 
acting like they had no idea this was going to come to pass. Of course 
they knew that millions of Americans would lose the good health care 
that they like. They just didn't think maybe that people would realize 
that it was the President's health care law that caused it and hold 
them accountable. And so now people are starting to be held 
accountable, as they should.
  But, Madam Speaker, there is a better way. In fact, I am proud to 
have led an effort to bring forward the American Health Care Reform 
Act, a true alternative to the President's health care law that 
actually starts addressing the problems to lower costs, to allow people 
to keep the good health care plans that they like, and to give people 
real options.
  In fact, our bill has over 100 cosponsors now, including medical 
doctors who serve in Congress who helped draft this bill, who 
understand that the doctor-patient relationship should continue to be 
maintained and be that sacred relationship that it used to always be 
before the government started coming in between people's health care, 
before IRS agents started coming in between people's health care.
  So this bill allows people to buy insurance across State lines, 
giving people real flexibility, real choice, real competition in health 
care, where people will be competing for your business to dramatically 
lower costs, to allow people to have the option to buy their own health 
care instead of going through their company, and they will be able to 
have the same tax benefits that a company gets. So if they buy a health 
care plan on their own that is better than what their employer 
provides, they will be able to deduct that cost, which they can't do 
today. It allows small businesses and even individuals to pool together 
and get the buying power of a large corporation. This is the way we 
should be doing this, Madam Speaker, not this government-run approach.

                          ____________________