Washington D.C. – Led by Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), top Democrat on the Senate health committee, today Senate Democrats took to the Senate floor to share stories from their constituents on the damage Trumpcare will cause and urge advocates and families to keep making their voices heard in opposition.
Last week, Sen. Murray heard directly from several patients and providers in Everett and Seattle about how devastating Trumpcare would be to Washington state, including local efforts to address the opioid crisis. In her Senate floor speech, Sen. Murray talked about meeting with Daniel Veach and Rachael Erks, who both shared how Medicaid has helped them continue their recovery from substance use disorder, but now worry that if Trumpare is passed, all the progress they’ve made would be at risk. In Washington state, over 260,000 people with Medicaid would lose coverage and nearly 30,000 patients could lose access to treatment for opioid addiction and other substance use disorders under Trumpcare.
Full text of Senator Murray’s floor speech:
"M. President, from the moment President Trump and Republicans began trying to jam Trumpcare through Congress, I heard from family after family in my home state about the damage their efforts to undermine families’ health care would do. And this last week was no different.
Again and again, my constituents told me what a difference it makes to have affordable insurance—to know that benefits like substance use treatment are covered—and to worry about how they would manage if Trumpcare ever becomes law.
I know some of my Republican colleagues went out of their way to avoid these kinds of stories while they were home, so I wanted to make sure they hear a few examples now that they are back in town. And I appreciate my Democratic colleagues who will be sharing stories they heard from their constituents over the past few days as well.
M. President, like many of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, I come from a state where the opioid epidemic has had a devastating impact. It has been both heartbreaking and inspiring to talk with patients and families who are doing everything they can do fight back. And right now, the message I’m getting from them—loud and clear—is: we don’t want Trumpcare.
One of my constituents, Daniel, was injured in the military and given a prescription for painkillers. He was on them for eight years—and during that time, he told me his three daughters wondered why he wouldn’t play with them. Eventually Daniel changed doctors and was prescribed Suboxone, which made all the difference for him.
He’s now able to work again and manages a grocery store—but he relies on Medicaid for health care coverage, which covers the hundreds of dollars a month his prescription costs. Daniel says that if he loses Medicaid coverage under Trumpcare, he won’t be able to make ends meet—and all of his progress would be threatened.
I also heard from my constituent Rachael in Seattle, who was addicted to opioids and living in her car when she found out she was eligible for Medicaid. Rachael got connected with Swedish Medical Center in Seattle, where she received wraparound health services, including mental and primary health care.
She and her husband are now successfully in recovery and raising a family, and Rachael is going to school. But just like Daniel—they do not know what they will do if Trumpcare becomes law and Medicaid coverage is taken away from them.
These are just two of countless stories I’ve heard from patients, families, and doctors in my home state and nationwide. I’ve heard from cancer survivors who have fought back as hard as they can—and worry that Trumpcare will allow insurance companies to price them out of care because they’re labeled with a pre-existing condition.
Young parents of medically fragile children, who stay up at night worrying about how to afford care for their toddler if lifetime caps on coverage are imposed under Trumpcare. Seniors who simply don’t have the savings to cover the premium spikes that Trumpcare would cause.
Women and men who are furious—and rightly so—that a group of 13 men wrote a bill in secret to defund Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest provider of women’s health care, removing a quality, affordable provider from communities where it is already difficult to get care.
These stories are powerful. They make it undeniably clear just how much Trumpcare would hurt people. So it’s no wonder that Senate Republicans spent the last week laying low and avoiding defending the indefensible.
M. President, Senate Republicans have read the same independent Congressional Budget Office analysis as we have. They’ve heard from the countless doctors, nurses, hospitals, nursing homes, and patient advocates about all the ways Trumpcare would raise families’ costs and take away coverage.
They know that people across the country completely, resoundingly reject Trumpcare. It is the least popular bill in three decades according to one study. All in all, Trumpcare shatters every promise President Trump and Republicans made about “providing insurance to everybody” and “making sure no one is worse off.”
And—incredibly—the extreme right-wing still thinks it leaves too much of the Affordable Care Act intact! But M. President—even though it seems you would be hard-pressed to find anyone who wants to stick up for Trumpcare—including President Trump—Senate Republican leaders are still doing everything they can to jam it through Congress as quickly as they can.
They’re working on backroom deals as we speak. And coming up with new ways to sweeten the deal for Senate Republicans who are rightly wary of voting for a bill that would so clearly do so much harm.
In particular I want to address the ongoing effort by extreme conservative Senators to double-down on pulling the rug out from under patients with pre-existing conditions.
They’ve put together a two-track plan to make middle class workers and families pay more…
If they get their way, Trumpcare will tell patients with pre-existing conditions—or anyone who happens to get sick in the middle of the year—“tough luck”…
…and they will do that in a way that even conservative experts predict will cause premiums to skyrocket…
And everyone else will be burdened with dramatically higher out-of-pocket costs when they need care.
Senate Republicans are coming up with other ideas too—like an opioid fund that a Republican governor said is like “spitting in the ocean.”
But let me be clear: there is no “fixing” Trumpcare. No tweak around the edges is going to turn Trumpcare—which is just a tax break for special interests in the health industry on the backs of patients—into a health care bill that actually helps people.
Trumpcare is mean at its core—and unless it is dropped altogether, Senate Republicans are going to have to decide whether they stand with their party or the people they came here to represent.
So—to everyone who has called, written, rallied, or tweeted—you are having an impact. You are why Trumpcare isn’t already law. But you can’t give up now—and Democrats here in the Senate won’t either.
We are going to keep doing everything we can to make sure Senate Republicans can’t hold their noses and vote for Trumpcare just to hand big corporations a tax break and President Trump a hollow political win.
And I also want to remind my Senate Republican colleagues—again—we’ve made clear all along—there is a better way. Democrats are ready and willing to work with you on policies that make health care more affordable and workable for patients and families.
So I hope you listen to the stories my Democratic colleagues are bringing to the floor, think about how devastating Trumpcare would be, and do the right thing by dropping this mean bill once and for all so that we can get to work on real healthcare solutions that help more people afford care, get covered, and stay healthy.
If you do—you won’t have to defend this defenseless bill a minute longer. Thank you and I yield the floor. "-----from a press release issued July 11th
https://www.murray.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/newsreleases?ContentRecord_id=7B34ACE3-B463-4C6D-A4C8-C42BFBE0C913
Related Story from the White House: White House Statement on CEA Analysis of BCRA Medicaid Provisions
"The Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) has analyzed the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) estimate of the Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA), particularly the bill’s effect on Medicaid since this effect has not been adequately analyzed. Although CBO’s estimates should be discounted because of the large errors made by the agency in estimating the toll of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), CEA’s analysis provides important information about the undescriptive CBO estimate regarding BCRA’s effect on federal Medicaid spending.While the media has reported that the BCRA makes significant Medicaid “cuts,” the BCRA results in at least $265 billion more federal Medicaid spending between 2018 and 2026, relative to 2017 levels of spending. This spending could be as high as $554 billion if CBO is wrong that people will drop Medicaid coverage simply because of repealing the individual mandate. Moreover, a large part of the reported “cuts,” which are actually reductions in the rate of federal Medicaid spending growth, result from CBO’s unlikely assumption that more than half of non-expansion states adopt the Medicaid expansion by 2026. Of crucial importance, the BCRA puts Medicaid on a sustainable trajectory. Specifically:
CEA found that in CBO’s analysis of the BCRA, 60 percent of the reduction in future increases in Medicaid spending will result from repealing the individual mandate and ending the enhanced match rate for states that have not already adopted Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion.
CEA estimated that repealing the individual mandate will result in Medicaid spending over the next decade to be $289 billion less than under current law as CBO believes that 4 million people, on net, in 2018 and 7 million people, on net, in 2026 will leave Medicaid. This estimate is likely substantially inflated since Medicaid enrollees currently pay little to no out of pocket costs and most are not subject to the individual mandate penalty.
CEA found that CBO’s analysis assumes that more than half of non-Medicaid expansion states will choose to adopt expansion under current law, and therefore Medicaid spending will increase by $170 billion over the next decade. But given that state legislatures in several expansion states, such as Ohio and Arkansas, are trying to trim Medicaid expansion due to cost overruns and that states’ share of the expansion bill increases over time, it is unlikely that many non-expansion states would adopt the expansion by 2026. In direct contrast to the CBO estimate, the Office of the Actuary at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services does not predict additional states will expand under current law.
CEA found that the remainder of reduced federal Medicaid spending over the next decade from CBO’s analysis totals $313 billion and is largely attributable to the phase-down of the enhanced match rate from 2021 to 2024 and structural Medicaid reforms. The phase-down of the enhanced match rate must occur for two important reasons. First, the Federal Government’s discrimination against traditional populations, such as the disabled and low-income children, pregnant women, and seniors in favor of the expansion population of non-disabled, working-age adults must end. Second, expansion costs are substantially higher than expected as many expansion states have richly rewarded healthcare special interests with federal money through the enhanced match.
The structural Medicaid reforms—capped allotments combined with additional state flexibility—will help preserve the program for those who truly depend on it while protecting taxpayers against wasteful and inefficient spending.'----From a press release issued July
https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/07/12/white-house-statement-cea-analysis-bcra-medicaid-provisions
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