The Amendment Process

Floor Speech

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Mr. BARRASSO. Thank you, Mr. President.

I concur with the distinguished Senator from Texas and the concerns that we have and we share about the lives of people all across the country and their ability to earn a living.

Tomorrow President Obama is planning to travel to Minnesota. So as I come to the floor the President is making the preparations because the President said he will spend the day in the shoes of a woman who had written a letter about the economic challenges she faces. I hope the President takes the time to actually talk to other people as well and spend a day in their shoes as well, because I think there are a lot of people in Minnesota--a lot of people in Minnesota--who would like to ask the President about his health care law and about some of the damaging side effects of the law.

The Mankato Times had a story from Minnesota schools to lose more than $200 million because of ObamaCare. A State representative is quoted as saying that wasteful spending on the health care law has left many taxpayers outraged because they will soon be making a significant impact on Minnesota schools, on the students in the State of Minnesota. Will the President address that?

According to documents released by Minnesota's Management and Budget Office, over the next 3 years, the total unfunded costs associated with the health care law compliance will cost school districts statewide at least $207 million. As the State representative said:

This is troubling news for our schools. This is $200 million that school districts won't be able to use to hire more teachers to improve their educational programs. This is an unneeded expense that does absolutely nothing for our students.

As the Minnesota State representative says: ``It is pretty sad when schools are forced to prioritize ObamaCare compliance over the education of our children.''

The President says the health care law should be forcefully defended and be proud of. Is that something the President is going to forcefully defend and be proud of? You take a look at the side effects of the health care law, so many side effects of the health care law.

One of the side effects is the medical device tax that Democrats included in the law. It is a destructive tax and is hitting the people on the ground in Minnesota where the President is going to be tomorrow. This destructive tax impacts the livelihood of individuals. These are the folks who work to make things such as pacemakers, artificial joints, ultrasound equipment. It is a tax the President asked for, the President demanded and wanted as part of the health care law, and that every Democratic Senator in this Chamber voted for, including the two Democratic Senators from Minnesota where the President will be tomorrow. It adds up to $3 billion a year. Companies will have to make up for that lost revenue. They are going to do it through higher prices on other individuals and moving some of their construction and their distribution overseas. Is that what the President wanted in this health care law? Will he forcefully defend and be proud of that?

According to a survey by an industry trade group about this--the folks who actually make these medical devices--that is exactly what is happening. Device manufacturers have had to cut 14,000 jobs because of the tax last year. They say they didn't hire another 19,000 they planned to hire. That is a total of 33,000 American jobs lost because of the taxes in the President's health care law. Now there are more than 350 medical device firms in Minnesota, companies in Minnesota that employ people on the ground in Minnesota, citizens who want to be hard-working individuals, supporting more than 30,000 jobs in Minnesota. Since the health care law passed, the medical device industry has lost more than 1,000 of those jobs in Minnesota where the President will be tomorrow. Is the President ready to stand with those individuals about the devastating side effects of his health care law?

One of the biggest device makers in the state is called Medtronix. They announced they are moving their headquarters to Ireland. That is not only because of the President's health care law and not every job lost in the industry is due solely to this one tax, but the Obama administration's burdensome tax policies and this terrible health care law side effects are impacting people all around the country and specifically in this area in Minnesota.

One of the side effects is fewer jobs for American families. The President has said that Democrats who voted for the law should forcefully defend and be proud of it. I hope someone in Minnesota will get the chance to ask the President tomorrow if he is proud of the thousands of jobs his health care law is costing the hard-working men and women who make these medical devices in this State of Minnesota. I hope the President will spend a day in the shoes of someone who lost their job as a medical device maker.

A lot of people in Minnesota and around the country are also worried about another devastating side effect of the health care law, and that is the impact on their paychecks--smaller paychecks that a lot of families are getting specifically because of the health care law. Yesterday there was an article in the Washington Post, page 2, Tuesday, June 24th: ``Businesses gear up for employer mandate.'' Subheadline: ``Some cut workers' hours; others struggle with costs, logistics.''

Well, what happens if you cut hours? What happens if you are struggling with costs? Who is impacted by that? Obviously, the families of the individuals who are working in those businesses. The article says employers around the country have been cutting their workers' hours back to part-time status. Part time in the health care law is defined as 30 hours a week. Most people think of a 40-hour workweek. Not President Obama. He has a different view of what a full-time job is. They had to cut back to part-time status in order to avoid paying for the expensive health care mandates required by the law.

The article in the Washington Post yesterday adds that ``seasonal employees and low wage workers such as adjunct professors, cafeteria staffers'' have been especially hard hit.

It is happening in Minnesota. The President is going to be there tomorrow, and he is going to say, ``I want to walk a day with this woman and see what her life is like.'' He can hand-select somebody who makes it look as though his policies might be working, but there are people in Minnesota who are being harmed by the President's policy.

In Faribault, MN, the city is to cut hours of workers because it cannot afford to pay for their insurance. The city of Mankato, MN, had to do the same, cutting most of their workers to 29 hours a week to keep under the limits set by the health care law. In Hastings, MN, the schools have to limit how much their classroom aides, food service, and transportation employees can work. The same thing is happening in towns and counties and businesses all over the State of Minnesota where the President will be tomorrow. They are cutting back hours, reducing the size of their paychecks, and why? Because of the health care law. Is the President going to spend a day in the shoes of someone who has had their hours cut back because of the health care law? Is he going to forcefully defend his law to those people when he is in Minnesota tomorrow?

Are the two Senators from Minnesota who voted for the health care law ready to forcefully defend the smaller paychecks these people are getting? This isn't just happening in Minnesota, it is happening all around the country. You know, it is not bad enough that these people are getting hit a second time by another very expensive side effect of the health care law--smaller paychecks. Now what they are seeing is higher premiums they have to pay. According to a new study, people in Minnesota are paying a lot more for health insurance. Why? Because of the health care law. For an average 64-year-old woman in Minnesota, premiums would have been $273 a month in 2013 before the mandates in the Obama health care law kicked in. But in 2014, buying insurance through an ObamaCare exchange, her premiums jumped to over $400 a month. She is paying $1,500 more this year than she did last year because of the President's health care law.

Who is going to forcefully defend that? Who is going to come and be proud on the floor of the Senate and speak with great pride about what they have done to this woman and the effect of this health care law in her life?

For a 27-year-old man, he would have paid an average of $95 a month in 2013. Under the ObamaCare law, he is paying $140 a month--an extra $540 this year compared to last year.

Can the Senators who voted for this law be proud of these kinds of premium increases? The American people wanted reform that gave them access to quality affordable care--access, quality, affordable. What they are getting is higher premiums, higher copays, higher deductibles.

Republicans have offered solutions for patient-centered health care, measures such as increasing the ability of small businesses to get together and negotiate better rates, expanding health savings accounts, allowing people to buy health insurance that works for them and their families because they know what is best for them and they don't need the government and President Obama to tell them that he knows better what they need in their lives than they know what they need in their lives. Republicans have offered ideas that would give people the care they need from a doctor they choose at a lower cost.

The President may not want to talk about any of these tomorrow in Minnesota, all the ways his health care law is hurting people in Minnesota and around the country, hurting education, hurting jobs, hurting the economy and hurting the pocketbooks of men and women around the country. But Republicans are going to keep coming to the floor, keep talking about the burdensome side effects, the expensive side effects, and sometimes the irreversible and sometimes fatal side effects as a result of this health care law. And we will continue to offer real solutions for better health care without the terrible side effects that the American public continues to face as a result of the President's health care law.
Thank you, Mr. President.

I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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