[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Pages 4798-4799]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              HEALTH CARE

  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I come to the floor to discuss the fourth 
anniversary of ObamaCare. Four years ago this past Sunday the President 
signed his health care legislation into law. The measure was jammed 
through Congress on a party-line vote against the strong objections of 
Republicans and the American people. Democrats and the President 
assured everyone this opposition was temporary. When people find out 
what is in the law, they will like it, Democrats and the President 
promised.
  Four years later, however, that isn't the case. The majority of the 
American people still disapprove of the law. Why do they still 
disapprove? Because the President's health care law has failed in every 
possible way. We have canceled health care plans. We have seen people 
who have lost their doctors and lost their hospitals. We have seen 
soaring premiums, higher out-of-pocket costs, lower pay, disastrous Web 
sites that have left thousands in limbo, confusion in the health 
insurance market, and widespread damage to the economy.
  The President's law has failed so badly that some of the President's 
strongest supporters are rejecting it. Young people whose support of 
the President was so successful in his election and reelection are 
turning their backs on the President's law. Unions which pushed for the 
law's passage and the President's reelection are now protesting that 
the law will destroy their health care plans and damage workers' 
livelihoods. Democrats running for reelection are running from the 
health care law as fast as they can for fear that association with 
ObamaCare will doom their chances of reelection. People are finding out 
what the law truly means for them and they don't like it.
  When the President was trying to pass his health care law, he made a 
few promises. I think a lot of people remember when the President said: 
If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan. 
He said: If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. The reality 
of the law has proven to be quite different.
  Six million Americans so far have lost their health care plans as a 
direct result of ObamaCare, and far too many of them found their only 
alternative was a plan that offered less coverage for more money. 
Millions of other Americans have lost their doctors and hospitals. 
ObamaCare placed a number of new taxes and regulations on insurance 
companies that left them facing huge cost increases. In an effort to 
manage their costs without raising health care premiums even further, 
many companies have narrowed their network of doctors and hospitals, 
especially in exchange plans. As a result, many Americans have lost 
doctors they have been seeing literally for years. Cancer patients in 
the middle of treatment have found their doctors are not covered by the 
new health care plans. Patients are also discovering their hospital 
options are now far more limited, as many plans exclude top hospitals.
  A recent article in the Associated Press reported:

       Some of America's best cancer hospitals are off-limits to 
     many of the people now signing up for coverage under the 
     Nation's new health care program.

  Practically speaking, the AP reports:

       Those patients may not be able to get the most advanced 
     treatment including clinical trials of new medications.

  In a particularly cruel twist, many of the patients who lost access 
to doctors and hospitals didn't know they would lose access when they 
signed up for their plans as provider information on the health care 
exchange Web sites is often, to quote a Business Week article, 
``missing, wrong, or difficult to navigate.''
  In addition to promising that patients would be able to keep their 
health care plans and their doctors, the President promised his health 
care law

[[Page 4799]]

would reduce health care costs, but in fact health care costs have only 
risen since the Affordable Care Act passed. Families and individuals 
who were effectively dumped into the exchanges have frequently found 
that their only health care options cost far more than their previous 
health care plans and offer far less.
  Family shopping for so-called silver plans now can face deductibles 
up to $12,700, a staggering amount of money that very few families are 
able to afford. For many families that number represents a full quarter 
of their income before taxes.
  Last week news emerged that already-high premiums on the exchanges 
are set to increase substantially next year. This was the headline in 
The Hill newspaper: O-Care premiums about to skyrocket. The Fiscal 
Times reported that Americans should ``expect premium prices to soar.'' 
In fact, The Hill reported that ``health industry officials say that 
ObamaCare-related premiums will double in some parts of the country.'' 
The Wall Street Journal reports that ``one recent analysis finds that 
80% of firms offering employee coverage have raised deductibles or 
other cost-sharing provisions, or are considering doing so . . . to 
avoid a new tax that's set to hit more lavish plans in 2018 and to 
counter health-cost increases. Thus, employee out-of-pocket costs could 
rise.'' Perhaps a more accurate name for the law would have been the 
``Unaffordable Care Act.''
  The havoc ObamaCare has wreaked on our health care system would be 
ample reason to dislike the law. ObamaCare's damage isn't limited to 
our health care system; it is also damaging our economy.
  The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reports that ObamaCare 
will result in 2\1/2\ million fewer full-time workers over the next 10 
years and reduce wages by more than $1 trillion. Those are real-world 
economic impacts.
  Household income has already dropped by almost $3,700 over the course 
of the Obama Presidency, and American families are already struggling. 
Unemployment is high and economic growth is sluggish. The last thing we 
need is fewer workers and lower wages.
  On top of that, ObamaCare is discouraging employers from hiring and 
reducing employees' hours, thanks to the slew of new taxes, mandates, 
and regulations ObamaCare levies on businesses large and small. Chief 
among these, of course, is the requirement that businesses with 50 or 
more employees provide health insurance to all of their full-time 
employees, which the law defines as those working 30 hours or more. If 
they don't do that, they pay fines. Faced with this mandate, State and 
local governments, nonprofits, and businesses with small profit margins 
have been forced to cut employees' hours to avoid health care bills or 
fines they can't afford to pay. Other businesses have been forced to 
keep their businesses under 50 workers instead of creating new jobs and 
hiring new people.
  Larger businesses are also deciding not to hire or even letting 
workers go as a result of the costly taxes and regulations the health 
care law imposes. According to a recent study, ObamaCare's tax on 
lifesaving medical devices, such as pacemakers and insulin pumps, has 
already affected more than 30,000 jobs in the medical device industry.
  I don't care what party you are from, you cannot think this law is 
working. Our health care system may have needed reform, but this was 
not the way to do it. Instead of improving our health care system, 
ObamaCare is making it far worse. It is time to repeal this law and 
pursue real solutions to our health care challenges.
  Instead of the failing government health care exchanges, we could 
create affordable health care plans by allowing the purchase of 
insurance across State lines. This would allow for interstate 
competition when it comes to the purchase and sale of insurance. That 
would increase competition among health plans, which in turn would 
drive prices down, not up, as is happening now.
  We could allow businesses to pool together to negotiate lower rates 
with health insurance companies.
  We could improve high-risk pools to help people with preexisting 
conditions and expand health savings accounts to allow families to put 
away money tax free to pay for future health care-related expenses.
  We could end the rampant lawsuit abuse that is driving up the cost of 
care for all Americans.
  We do need real reform of our health care system--the kind of reform 
that will actually drive down costs and expand access to care while 
allowing Americans, not the government, to make decisions about the 
health care plans they choose and the doctors they visit. ObamaCare is 
doing the opposite.
  ObamaCare isn't working. We need to repeal it now and replace it with 
real health care reforms so that Americans don't have to endure another 
4 years like the last 4.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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