Prayer
Floor Speech
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Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come to the floor today, just 6 days now before the Obama health care law exchanges go into effect, to point out that even those who may support the law say with regard to the exchanges, expect trouble. It was interesting that today the District of Columbia--their health exchange announced it is not going to be able to be ready to go October 1 for those seeking information regarding tax credits, for those asking about Medicaid coverage. People will still be able to submit applications online but apparently they need to then have this information go to so-called experts with an eligibility determination not to be made until sometime in November.
I applaud the District for pointing this out, that this is what they found because what they attributed the delay to was a ``high error rate'' discovered during testing. I am delighted that they were actually doing testing, discovered this high error rate and made that decision. But as people take a look at the upcoming exchanges as they open, I believe these exchanges open doors to fraud and to identity theft. The reason I say this is we are hearing this actually reported from supporters, again, of the health care law.
I will quote someone who has worked in support of the law in Chicago who says that, ``Fraudsters are poised to take advantage of widespread confusion over the Affordable Care Act--also known as ObamaCare--to take advantage of widespread confusion to steal Americans' credit cards, Social Security numbers, and other personal information.''
My goodness, how can that happen? It happens for a number of reasons. One is because of all of these so-called navigators, people who are hired by the government or people posing as those hired by the government to help folks sign up on the exchange. When they fill out the paperwork or fill out the computer forms, the information they are going to send in is to go to the data hub--tax information, income information, employment information, patient record information, Social Security number, welfare information, family size, demographic data--and then where does all this information go?
No. 1, to the Department of Justice. Also to the Social Security Administration. Also the Department of Homeland Security to check citizenship. Of course the Social Security Administration will validate birth, validate the person is not dead, validate the Social Security number. The Department of Justice will check on criminal history. The Health and Human Services Department, another recipient of the information, will check enrollment or eligibility for entitlement programs, collects and analyzes medical data. Then of course the IRS, who are the folks who are the enforcers of the Obama health care law--the enforcers will, along with the Treasury Department, verify employment stats, individual income stats, determine premium subsidies, all with the potential for significant fraud and all because of a lack of providing the privacy safeguards that the law mandates this administration to provide.
Yet the administration is not doing so. A number of us have been asking for months to see what is involved with these so-called navigators. What kind of education do they need? What kind of background checks are there? We still have not been able to get the information we are seeking.
We want to know: Do these people have to have a driver's license? Do they have to be of a certain age? Do they have to have a high school diploma? Do they have to have a criminal background check? Yet this administration will not give out that information about those individuals. Even the census takers have to have completed a certain level of education and have a criminal background check.
Yet this administration is not asking of those who were supposed to be the navigators handed very confidential information, of course, subject to fraud and identity theft when you give that sort of information--and I say to people all around the country it is time to beware next Tuesday when the exchange is open.
I just quoted a couple of things that supporters of the health care law have said, such as expect trouble and worry about con artists. Here are some other things that some of the supporters have said--people who supported the adoption of this law in the first place. They said: It will destroy the foundation of the 40-hour workweek that is the backbone of the American middle class. These, of course, are union folks who are saying: Hey, this is going to end up forcing millions out of their multi-employer plans. It will create unstoppable incentives for employers to reduce weekly hours for workers. We see that all across the country.
Just last week the Cleveland Clinic--a wonderful health care institution and one of the major employers in the State of Ohio--announced that because of the health care law and because of the cuts in reimbursement, the Cleveland Clinic is going to cut hundreds of millions of dollars from their budget and actually reduce their workforce because of the President's health care law and the things they are learning about the law as time goes on.
It is interesting to see a union leader say: In its rush to achieve its passage, many of the act's provisions were not fully conceived. People on this side of the aisle were telling Members of this body that very thing a number of years ago before the law was passed in this body on a sole party-line basis.
Yesterday, President Obama, once again, tried to bring in help, and he provided essentially the warmup act for an infomercial with President Bill Clinton, the so-called secretary of explaining stuff, because the President has failed to explain benefits of the health care law to the point that it would actually convince the American people it was good for them. Currently, the President is under water in the polls regarding his leadership on health care, and this health care law continues to be very unpopular with the American people.
More people think their costs will go up and their benefits will go down than the other way around. So they are looking at their own quality of care and what it means to them: paying more, getting less, something that the American people don't want.
So in an effort to try to provide some solace to the American people, this is what the President said yesterday in New York: Make your own decision about whether it is good for you. What we are confident about is when people look and see they can get high-quality affordable health care for less than their cell phone bill, they are going to sign up.
I would say if you use that criteria, you are going to have very few people signing up for your health care law.
According to the 2012 report issued by the Cellular Telecommunications Industry, the average monthly cell phone bill was about $47. So make your own decision--less than your cell phone bill. So what the President is saying is that for less than $47 a month, people will be able to receive insurance.
The interesting thing is that, of course, the President says that is with the subsidies. But for many people the subsidies are not in any way going to reduce the cost of their insurance at all, and it may not go up as high as many people had feared, but it is still going to be higher than they are paying now because of the sticker shock that is coming.
This is today's Wall Street Journal. This is coming out of the administration:
Prices Set For New Health-Care Exchanges.
Across the country, the average premium for a 27-year-old nonsmoker, regardless of gender, will start at $163 a month for the lowest-cost ``bronze'' plan.
That is just about four times the average of a monthly cell phone bill. So could the President of the United States be mistaken?
Let's look around the country. They say:
Likewise, the least-expensive bronze policy would rise to $195 a month in Philadelphia for that same 27-year-old, from $73 today.
So it would go from $73 up to $195.
Let's look at my home State of Wyoming. I am still reading from the front page of today's Wall Street Journal.
In Cheyenne, Wyo., the lowest-cost option would be $271 a month, up from $82 today.
This just goes to prove that when Washington comes up with something, it does not one-size-fits-all across this country, and in rural States around the country there are huge problems related to the very fact that one size doesn't fit all.
In spite of the President's comparison to a cell phone bill, what we are seeing is that people all across the country are going to be paying excessive amounts of money for insurance in spite of the President's promises that if you like what you have, you can keep it. We know that is not the case for many people, as the unions have spoken of, and we know that what the President promised of lowering insurance premiums by $2,500 per family by the end of his first term never materialized and the costs continue to go up.
So this health care law has turned out to be terrible for patients, the providers, the nurses, and doctors who take care of them, and it is going to be terrible for taxpayers.
There was an interesting story on the front page of the New York Times on Monday: ``Lower Premiums to Come at Cost of Fewer Choices.'' In new plans, insurers often leave out many providers. I think that is the key: leave out many providers. Because what we are seeing is that in many locations around the country, hospitals have been excluded, doctors have been excluded, and there is going to be significant explaining to be done when people realize that they are not going to be able to continue to go to the pediatrician that their children have been going to since birth. They are not going to be able to go to the hospital in their community. They are not going to be able to keep the health care plan they have.
So it is interesting to see in a Blue Cross/Blue Shield in New Hampshire, one of the Nation's largest insurers has put a plan together that is consistent with the health care law, and it has created a furor. The reason it has created this furor is that it excludes 10 of the State's 26 hospitals from the health plans it is going to sell through the insurance exchange.
The insurance exchange, regardless of what the President promises, is going to be something which potentially causes fraud, abuse, and loss of the care that you have, the doctor that you have, and the hospital that you have.
The article points specifically to the State of California. In California, it says the statewide Blue Shield developed a network specifically for consumer shopping in the insurance exchange.
The executive vice president of Blue Shield of California said the network for its exchange plans had 30,000 doctors or 53 percent of the doctors in the State. So they only include about half the doctors, not all the doctors, and they said the new network you get through the exchange in California--remember this is a State-run exchange that the President has touted as a successful exchange--``did not include the five medical centers of the University of California or the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center near Beverly Hills'' that are all well known for their excellent reputation. It is a place that patients want to go for care.
So go to the exchange in California, sign up for something the President has promised you, and then if you need to use that insurance card, you will learn that you are not welcomed and your card is not accepted at the five medical centers at the University of California or the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center near Beverly Hills.
That is what we have under this health care law, and that is why we need to repeal it and replace it with patient-centered care so patients can get the care they need from a doctor they choose at a lower cost.
I yield the floor.
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