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Floor Speech
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Mr. WELCH. Madam President, there is a lot of focus on what divides us, but the real opportunity here is what unites us. We are having a contest here with this shutdown, where our side is very concerned about what happens with these tax credits; your side is very concerned about using a shutdown as a tactic.
I think we both have pretty valid arguments, and one of the reasons I think there is merit in our position is the reality that, once the December 31 deadline arrives, people literally are going to lose healthcare.
So what unites us? Both sides really do want to have all of government paid and be reopened. And both sides, I believe, want to make certain the people we represent continue to have access to healthcare--that the healthcare they had in 2025 they are going to have in 2026.
That won't happen unless we resolve this. And given the time crunch, the only way, as a practical matter, we can do something that helps the people you represent, that helps the people I represent, is to extend what we have for another year.
So it is not an overreach on the part of, say, folks who want a single-payer healthcare system. It is not overreach or diminishing any concerns that folks on the Republican side--and, by the way, on our side--have about the cost of healthcare.
We are in a practical crunch, where, unless this U.S. Senate acts, the people we represent are going to lose healthcare. That is the fact. That is just the fact. It is the way it is, and we talked about how these premium increases are going to spike.
So what do we do in this situation where Leader Thune, who we trust, who we respect, is taking a position that we won't have discussions until we reopen government.
Why do we object to that or are cautious about that? We trust Leader Thune. We trust our Republican colleagues. But what happens after it goes out of the Senate? We have no guarantee whatsoever it will be taken up in the House at all.
So the question that farmer in Vermont would ask me, at the end of any agreement, is: Peter, what does this mean? Will I get my healthcare in 2026?
And unless we have it where it is going to get a vote with some support from our colleagues in the House, the answer is: I don't know, but I hope so.
So we find ourselves with January 1 here, and that farmer, that small business person, not having healthcare. And, again, this is the lament I have. What we are trying to do here--the folks who are going to benefit or not suffer are Republicans who voted for Trump and Democrats who voted for Harris and Independents who didn't like either candidate at all.
So we have an opportunity--and actually, we are the only people in the United States of America who have an opportunity--the only people, it is us, who have been entrusted by the people whom we represent, with their vote, to solve this problem.
And what I think is being proposed has a quality that is rare around here. It is restraint. We are not trying to overreach. We are just saying: Maintain the status quo so that the folks in America who are getting their healthcare with the help of some tax credits will continue to have that healthcare in 2026, as they have in 2025.
So I hope we can come together for this temporary fix. And, by the way, I just want to say, the cost of healthcare is exploding, and we have an obligation if we want to maintain access to healthcare, to address that.
It is not a solution to deal with the healthcare crisis by taking people off of healthcare. They still get sick. So when our leader says that we want this bipartisan committee to address the cost of healthcare, we are sincere about that because the biggest threat to the continued access to healthcare is the exploding cost of healthcare.
I yield to my colleague from Wisconsin.
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