S. 151

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, yesterday I stood on the floor of our esteemed Senate, and I said: The Senate needs to do more. The Senate needs to do more.

I was very careful--and I want to reaffirm today--I was very careful not to say we are not doing anything. I talked about our important work on confirming judges. I think we are putting some very fine men and women on the Federal bench, who are going to make our country safer and better. I was also very careful to talk about the fact that after a logjam had been created on the appointments for the President's administration, we were finally able to break that logjam. We have started confirming some new advisers for the President.

I am very proud of the good work this body has done, but I did make the point that we need to do more. I talked about the fact that, in my judgment, there are many issues--if we think about them--on which my Democratic friends and my Republican colleagues have more in common than we don't, but we can't determine whether that is accurate unless we vote, unless we bring bills to the floor, unless we get bills in front of the committee and mark them up. That is our word, as you know, for amending a bill.

One of the bills I talked about yesterday was the need for bipartisan support for trying to do something about the spam, fraudulent robocalls the American people are getting, about which Senator Collins just spoke so eloquently. I said there would be bipartisan support. I believed it. I believe it even more today. I am very proud of the Senate because we just passed a bill. Do you know how many people voted against it? One. One ``no'' vote. See what happens when Senators are allowed to be Senators?

There are other efforts that we can work on together. The cost of prescription drugs--I spoke about that yesterday. I don't want to go into it more today.

I will give you another one, and I know this is controversial, but I think it is less controversial than people realize--net neutrality, the importance of people being able to access the Internet freely without being blocked or without their speeds being throttled or without their being censored.

That is a very controversial issue around here, but I still believe we share more in common than we don't on that issue. I talk with my colleagues all the time. I say: We need to pass a bill. Do you know why? Because the businessmen and the businesswomen and the consumers need some predictability in this area. What happens now is, if we have a Democratic President who gets control of the FCC, they pass one set of net neutrality rules, and then if we have a Republican President who gets control of the FCC, they pass a different set of net neutrality rules. The business community and the consumers are like ping pong balls. There is no predictability. There is no certainty. You can't plan. So everybody says: We need to pass a bill. Well, I am going to say it too. We need to pass a bill, but the only way to pass a bill is to pass a bill. And I think that is an area where we can work.

Another area--I understand how hard it is to fix our healthcare delivery system, but we ought to at least try. Our efforts in the last Congress to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act did not work. We could not pass the bill. I do not know a single person, honestly, a fairminded person who thinks the Affordable Care Act is working. But there are things we can do in the meantime while we are trying to reach an agreement on health insurance and the healthcare delivery system that looks like somebody designed the two things on purpose. There are things we can do together in the meantime.

I think there is bipartisan support for the idea that if you have health insurance and you go to the emergency room--and you picked an emergency room at a hospital that is under your policy--and you go and you pay your $500 deductible, a month later, you should not get a bill for $1,000. You call them up and you say: What do you mean? The hospital is listed on my policy. I did what I was supposed to do. I went there. It was an emergency, but I did not go to the closest hospital. I went to the hospital in my policy, and I get a bill for $4,000.

They say: Oh, that doctor, that radiologist--not to pick on radiologists--that radiologist wasn't covered by your plan.

Well, how am I supposed to know?

We can address that. I guarantee you that there is bipartisan support to do something about that. We might not agree on the details, but that is why, you know, God created the Senate floor. You come down here, you debate, you discuss, and you offer amendments.

There are other examples. Let me say I am cutting this short because we are about to have another vote on a disaster bill. Thank you. Thank you, United States Senate. Thank you, President Trump, for meeting us in the middle.

I am not clairvoyant, but I feel really good about its passing--not good for the Senate as an institution, although I am proud of us today, but good for our farmers and our people in so many States who have been hurt by natural disasters--wildfires and hurricanes. Puerto Rico was hit with two hurricanes right in a row. We are going to do something about that today. I am happy for the Senate, but I am even happier for the American people.

I am going to say it again. We have more in common--our Democratic colleagues and our Republican colleagues--than we don't on certain issues, and I think we would surprise ourselves in what we could achieve if we just try.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source