[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1994, Book II)]
[September 26, 1994]
[Pages 1632-1633]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Statement on Health Care Reform Legislation
September 26, 1994

    Today Senator George Mitchell reported that he sees no way to pass 
health care reform in this session of Congress. He and the bipartisan 
group of Senators have been doing their best. But he cannot find the 60 
votes needed to overcome the Republican filibuster.
    I am very sorry to say that this means Congress isn't going to 
reform health care this year. But we are not giving up on our mission to 
cover every American and to control health care costs.
    When I addressed Congress a year ago, I said our journey to health 
care reform would have some rough spots in the road. Well, we've had a 
few. But this journey is far, far from over.
    Some Republican leaders keep saying, ``Let's put this off until next 
year.'' I am going to hold them to their word. We have reached out to 
Republicans, and we will continue to do that. But we are going to keep 
up the fight against the interests who spent $300 million to stop health 
care reform. We will fight for campaign finance and lobby reform, so 
these special interests do not continue to obstruct vital legislation, 
and we will return to the fight for health care reform. There is too 
much at stake for all the American people, and we have come too far to 
just walk away now.
    Although we have not achieved our goal this year, Hillary and I are 
proud--and our allies should be proud as well--that we were able to 
bring this debate further than it has ever

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progressed before. For solid, smart, and important reasons, the ordinary 
working families of America expect their elected leaders to pass health 
care reform:
    --If we don't act, the deficit we have worked so hard to contain 
        will balloon again over time.
    --And, most important, millions of Americans still won't be able to 
        count on coverage when their families need it. Every month that 
        we don't act, 100,000 more Americans will lose their coverage. 
        They will join the 5 million Americans who lost theirs in the 
        last 5 years.
    For their sake, and for the sake of those who touched us during this 
great journey, we are going to keep up this fight and we will prevail.