John Barrasso

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I would be happy to, as a matter of record, submit for the record the GAO study that was reported by Senators Coburn and Enzi to outline the entire study and the reason I am objecting today.

Mr. BARRASSO. Yes.

Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, reserving the right to object, the Senator's unanimous-consent request contains components he knows are controversial and opposed by numerous Senators and for that reason that proposal cannot pass the Senate today. Specifically, the proposal would extend the TAA-related provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, better known as the failed stimulus package, which most Members of this side of the aisle strenuously opposed for very sound reasons. That stimulus spent approximately $1 trillion under the guise that it would keep unemployment rates below 8 percent. Yet nearly 2 years later, we are still at a point where unemployment rates, which had risen to the area of 10 percent, are now still at 9 percent. I am reminded this is nearly double the average annual rate of the last administration. It would be one thing if there was clear evidence that differing TAA programs were effective in meeting these intended goals, but research suggests the efficacy of the TAA training funding is not as convincing. At the insistence of Senators Coburn and Enzi, the GAO found that in fiscal year 2009, nine Federal agencies spent approximately $18 billion to administer 47 separate employment and job training programs, including TAA. Despite large Federal spending, GAO could not conclude whether the programs have had any meaningful benefit. The GAO report states: Little is known about the effectiveness of the employment and training programs we identified because only 5 reported demonstrating whether outcomes can be attributed to the program through an impact study. As a result, I object.

Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I object.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. There are things we mutually must do to make it easier and cheaper for people to get the health care they need, the doctors they want, at the price they can afford. Number 1, as my colleague mentioned, make it legal for people to shop around and buy across State lines. We can't do that right now in this country. That in itself, as studies show, would result in over 10 million Americans who don't have insurance today getting insurance. Most people get their insurance through work for the simple reason that it is a tax deduction to the company they get their insurance through, but if they buy insurance personally, individually, they have to pay taxes on that money before they pay for the insurance. So I think people who end up buying their health insurance individually ought to get the same tax benefits as those who get it through work do. That would make a big difference in bringing down the specific costs to those folks. I think we need to have incentives that help people actually stay healthy. I ran a program in Wyoming. I was a volunteer at a program called the Wyoming Health Fairs, bringing low-cost health screenings to people. I did health reports on television called ``Helping You Care For Yourself,'' giving people information they could use to stay healthy. This health care law has money in it aimed at prevention, but it basically has money for jungle gyms and street lamps and pathways, but actually no incentive to get somebody to get up and exercise and get their weight down and their cholesterol under control, their blood pressure under control. Then I think we have to do something about the lawsuit abuse out there, which drives up the cost of care as doctors order tests not necessarily to help the patient but to make sure they are not missing some very rare condition, and that significantly adds to the cost of care, in the billions and billions of dollars every year.

Mr. BARRASSO. We are doing exactly that. As of last week, the Secretary of Health and Human Services has given--just last week--500 new waivers to allow individuals who get their insurance through work, and now a total of 729 waivers affecting 2.2 million people to opt out--individuals to opt out--of the specific requirement. I think States ought to have the right to make decisions about the Medicaid mandate, about the individual mandate that requires everyone to buy government-approved health insurance. It is a mandate. Congress is telling people they have to buy government-approved health insurance. I think it is unconstitutional. The Supreme Court will ultimately decide. People will get penalized. There are going to be IRS agents checking to make sure people have this government-mandated and government-approved health insurance. I think people ought to be able to--the State ought to decide if they are going to make every employer in the State--the business creators, the entities that hire people, the small businesses, the job creators--I think the State ought to have the right to make the decision to say, Are we going to make those employers--force them--to provide government-approved health insurance. It is a big cost for businesses that are trying to hire people. I think States ought to be able to opt out of the benefit mandate which defines how much insurance somebody has to have. Also, in many cases it is overinsurance--more than they need, more than they want, and more than they can afford.

Mr. BARRASSO. Well, of the 2.2 million people who have gotten waivers by the Secretary of Health and Human Services--and, as I say, you need to have friends in high places if you want a waiver, because I know the small business owners in my State, and probably in the State of the Senator from South Carolina as well, couldn't get to the Secretary of Health and Human Services to get these waivers. But 860,000 waivers have gone to members of 166 different unions' benefit programs. It is interesting, because across the country unions have received 40 percent of the waivers, yet union members are only 7 percent of the workforce. So it seems a disproportionate number of these waivers have been given to members of the unions. What I find so intriguing is that these are the same people from the same unions that lobbied so hard to get this health care law passed. Now that they know what is in it, they don't want it to apply to them. That is a concern about which I think the American people will say, Well, if all of these different union members can get a waiver, why can't I? Why can't States be able to opt out as well? In a national poll last Friday, February 4, the majority of Americans said States ought to have the right to opt out of the health care law. A majority of Americans believe their State ought to have a right to opt out. We now know that seven states--Arizona, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Virginia--have already passed laws or constitutional amendments making it illegal to force anyone to buy health insurance. Their State legislatures--to me, that is how I am reading it--say, we are going to opt out whether this law passes or not.

Mr. BARRASSO. The people of Wyoming overwhelmingly want the opportunity to remove themselves from the heavy burden of the Obama- passed and supported health care law. There are huge expenses. The Medicaid mandate is huge.

Mr. BARRASSO. I think the attorneys general are making decisions based on what they believe is in the best interests of the citizens of their State, and they are saying, People of our State have rights, and we have a Constitution, and that Constitution should trump the 2,700- page health care law.

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come today to the Senate floor as a physician who has practiced medicine in Wyoming for a quarter of a century, taking care of the families of Wyoming, and to do what I have done throughout the past year--provide a doctor's second opinion on this health care law people across the country are now coming to grips with as they finally are realizing what is in the bill or, as the former Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, once said: First you have to pass it before you get to find out what is in it. People are finding out what is in it, and people all across the country are not happy. We know what the American people want. I know what the people of Wyoming want in terms of health care. They want the care they need from the doctor they want at a cost they can afford. That was the goal many of us had over a year ago when we started this discussion and debate on the Senate floor. What ultimately got passed-- and many people believe crammed down the throats of the American people--is now a health care law where people are at risk of losing what they want and what they have. The promises made by the President are such that they have turned to be, in many ways, unfulfilled. The President said this would actually drive down the cost of care--the health care law--that insurance rates would go down $2,500 per family. What people have seen all across the country is the cost of their health care insurance rates going up instead of down. The President said: If you like the care you have, you can keep it. Now we know that a majority of people who get their health insurance through their work are not going to be able to keep the coverage they have liked. So I come to the floor with my colleague, Senator Graham, because we have introduced a bill, S. 244, the State Health Care Choice Act, which allows States to make a decision to say: Is this something we want in our State? I will turn to my colleague from South Carolina before getting into the specifics. I know the Senator has visited with his Governor about the concerns his Governor has, a newly elected Governor who has concerns and actually addressed those concerns with the President about the health care law and the mandates on the people of South Carolina. So I would ask my friend and colleague, are there things we as a body ought to be considering to make life easier for the people of his home State of South Carolina? And I can talk about things for Wyoming as well.

Mr. BARRASSO. Twenty-six States have joined the lawsuit, including my home State of Wyoming which recently joined. New Governors have been elected and sworn into office in January, so five new States have joined the lawsuit, saying, This law isn't constitutional. People from Congress shouldn't be able to go into your home and make you buy a government-approved product if you don't want to buy it. The background of the Senator from South Carolina is superior to mine in the legal field or the courts, but it sure sounds to me as if rulings from Virginia and Florida uphold my firm belief that Congress can't make people buy products.

Mr. BARRASSO. Seven States have already passed laws or constitutional amendments making it illegal to force someone to buy health insurance.

Mr. BARRASSO. That is why we come to the floor to discuss S. 244. The title is State Health Care Choice Act. That is what it truly is--State health care, and choice. It is a choice to be made by the States about health care because if the American people want anything, it is flexibility, freedom, and choice.

Mr. BARRASSO. I yield the floor.

Mr. BARRASSO. What do people want? What do the States want? Flexibility, freedom, and choice. I know that is what people in Wyoming want. We are rugged individuals who want flexibility, freedom, and choice. I think every State ought to have the opportunity to make that decision, and that is why this bill is on the floor of the Senate. Last week I did vote to repeal the entire Obama health care law because I think it is bad for patients and providers--the nurses and the doctors who take care of those patients--and I think it is bad for the taxpayers. I think it will bankrupt the Nation. I think what is now happening is it is also bankrupting the States. Governors, having to deal with this Medicaid mandate, are realizing that to listen to Washington, they are going to have to take money away from education. They are going to have to take money away from public services. They ought to have a right to make a decision at the State level as to what they want to do, what laws ought to apply. One size doesn't fit all. I know what works in Wyoming is not necessarily what works in South Carolina or West Virginia and certainly may not work in California or New York. That is why States ought to make a decision about ways to help people in their own State get the care they need from the doctors they want at prices they can afford. This massive health care law does not accomplish that.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to enter into a colloquy with my colleague, the Senator from South Carolina, Mr. Graham.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. The President said the same thing in June of 2009 when he visited and spoke to the American Medical Association. So when that issue didn't really come to the floor, as a number of us would have liked, in this health care law that was written, as I say, behind closed doors, they asked Howard Dean, then-chairman of the Democratic National Committee, why they don't include it, and he said: We can't stand up to the trial lawyers--who have such a remarkable influence on the party on the other side of the aisle. I am hoping that the President, in his statement in his State of the Union Address, was sincere because it clearly did not follow through what he said in June of 2009 when he met with doctors from all across the country.

Mr. BARRASSO. I would like to see every citizen in this country get a waiver. I would like every State to have an opportunity to get waivers because last week the Secretary of Health and Human Services gave another 500 new waivers. The total now is 729 waivers. You can find them on the HHS Web site. It covers 2.2 million people. It is interesting because before this bill was passed through in the middle of the night, labor unions publicly supported this health care law. Now there are 166 union benefit funds that are exempt and have gotten the waivers. They got the waivers. Unions now have 860,000 out of the 2.2 million waivers. Unions now have 40 percent of all the waivers even though they are only 7 percent of the private sector workforce in this country. My question to my colleague is, if this law is so good, why do so many people who supported it in the first place now say they don't want it to apply to them? Is it, as Nancy Pelosi said when she was Speaker of the House before the election--before the election that repudiated this health care law and the way it was crammed down the throats of the American public--didn't Speaker Pelosi say that first you have to pass it before you get to find out what is in it? It seems to me, and I ask my colleague from Arizona, that as people know more about what is in this law, it is less popular on a daily basis. Yesterday, 58 percent of Americans, in a Rasmussen poll, said they would like to have it repealed, and the numbers of people who thought all of us ought to be able to get waivers was even higher than that.

Mr. BARRASSO. What we are trying to do is actually provide people with the care they need, the doctors they want, at a cost they can afford. Yet, when we look at this health care law that--remember, it was written behind closed doors in spite of the promises. That is why people were so offended and are still opposed to this. We had votes in the middle of the night, and there were all those special deals cut for Senators to get that 60th vote. What I hear most about as I travel my State are the proposed cuts to Medicare. As the Senator mentioned, it was $500 billion. You talked about the President having a commission to look at the debt. What that commission said is that if you are going to take money from Medicare, which this law does--$500 billion--it doesn't do it to help strengthen Medicare or lengthen the life or the vitality of Medicare; it does it to start a whole new government program. It takes $155 billion from hospitals, $202 billion from the 11 million seniors on Medicare Advantage, $15 billion from nursing homes, $40 billion from home health agencies, and $7 billion from hospices. As my colleague from Arizona said--he mentioned the CLASS Act, which has been called a Ponzi scheme that Bernie Madoff would be proud of. The President's own debt commission says repeal that because, with the way that is set up in terms of taking the money in first so they can count that as coming in, the obligations 10 years and beyond will bankrupt this country. Everyone on both sides of the aisle realizes that. The bipartisan President's debt commission realized it to the point that they put it in one of their recommendations. To hear our colleagues and the last speaker talk about the fact that this may actually help with the deficit and with the debt, anybody who looks at this over the long term and the nature of our country knows this will bankrupt the country. I worry about the jobs in this country. We are at 9.4 percent unemployment. I know both of us as Senators are working to try to find ways to make it easier and cheaper to create private sector jobs in America. This health care law makes it more expensive and harder to create private sector jobs.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. After the Senator finishes.

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, the headline of the article is: ``Repeal of `Obamacare' Would Help Wyoming.'' I want to cite a few excerpts: Repeal of Obamacare would help Wyoming because that law is a disaster for our country. Our American health care system costs too much. There are too many uninsured. Obama reform makes these problems worse. The centerpiece of the Obama effort to insure the uninsured is to expand the Medicaid program, the existing program for poor people. This is the most expensive way available to insure the uninsured. This is from someone who has studied this for 20 years. He goes on to say: The Medicaid program is designed to be a high-cost program. The Federal Government has required a set of Medicaid benefits that are richer than any insurance the rest of us can buy. The Feds forbid most of the effective cost controls the rest of us face. One consequence is that Medicaid clients are free to use the hospital emergency room for things most of us take care of at home. The health care costs for an adult in Medicaid are one and a half times larger than for a comparable adult insurance by our largest private insurer and a child costs two and a half times as much. Those are the things we are dealing with. That is the solution the Democrats have presented to the country. That is what has been passed. This solution is not a solution. What we need to do is repeal and replace this health care law. The American people notice when month after month the Secretary of Health and Human Services rolls out more waivers for people under this health care law. Last week, she granted 500 new waivers. We now have 2.2 million Americans to whom this law does not apply. They have gotten their waivers, so it doesn't apply to them. You might say: Who are these people? Well, they are people with friends in high places, because 166 of these are union benefit funds-- 166 entities covering 860,000 Americans. These are some of the same union members who lobbied Congress, who contributed in ways to say we need this health care law. Yet they say: Oh, once we have looked at it--followed Nancy Pelosi's idea and actually read the bill to see what was in it after it got passed--we don't want it to apply to us. So 40 percent of all the waivers have gone to unions, even though union workers only account for 7 percent of the private workforce in this country. Well, if this health care law is so great for the country, why should companies and unions need waivers? And why can't the rest of America receive a waiver and get the same treatment? That is why I come to the floor today, to tell my colleagues this health care law is bad for patients, it is bad for providers--the nurses and the doctors who take care of those patients--and it is bad for the taxpayers. By voting to repeal this health care law, we will give these waivers to every American and give them the opportunity and the freedom they request, and the flexibility they need to get the health care that works best for them, not a one-size-fits-all approach that comes out of Washington loaded with Washington wasteful spending. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I come to support Senator McConnell's amendment to repeal this health care law. I listen very carefully. I listen to the people in Wyoming. The University of Wyoming conducted a survey. Sixty-eight percent of people in my home State want this law repealed. The people of Wyoming have great concerns about the unfairness of the law. Our seniors who rely on Medicare are concerned with the unfairness of a law that takes over $500 billion from them, from our seniors on Medicare, not to help Medicare, not to save Medicare, not to secure Medicare, but to start a whole new government entitlement program for someone else. Let's look at the specific cuts to Medicare: $155 billion from hospitals; $202 billion from the 11 million seniors on Medicare Advantage, and there is an advantage to Medicare Advantage. That is why so many seniors have signed up for it. Nearly $15 billion from nursing homes; another $40 billion from home health agencies; and $7 billion from hospice. The President the other night, in his State of the Union Address, said: If you have some ideas on ways to get down the cost of care and improve care, I want to listen. Republicans have been bringing ideas to the floor during the entire year-long debate, and those ideas have been ignored and rejected. I suggest the President listen to his own Debt Commission. He appointed the Commission. They had a lengthy discussion. What the members of the Debt Commission said is that if you cut Medicare, a program designed for seniors, do not do what you did, do not do what you suggested, Mr. President, do not do what the Democrats in the Senate have suggested, do not do what Nancy Pelosi wanted. If you cut that kind of money from Medicare, the Commission says, you should use that to help and save Medicare, not start a new government entitlement. The Commission also said that we should repeal the CLASS Act. That is a part of this health care law. It is called the CLASS Act. It has been described by Democrats as a Ponzi scheme that would make Bernie Madoff proud because of the fact they use trickery, gimmicks to say: We will bring in money now and the big costs will not show up until 10 years from now. I heard my distinguished colleague from West Virginia talking about small business and the tax credits. The small business owners in Wyoming looked to that. What they found is if they want to hire an additional worker, if they are at 10 or 11 workers and want to go to 12, they lose part of the credits. Do you know how much low-paying jobs have to be to get the tax credits? The average income has to be $25,000. It cannot be higher than $25,000 a year. If you want to give someone a raise, you are going to lose your tax credits. Small business owners across the country who looked closely at this issue have said this does not help me at all. They are saying we need to make it cheaper and easier to create private sector jobs, and this health care law, with its expensive mandates and obligations, makes it more expensive and tougher to create private-sector jobs. We want this law repealed. Just yesterday, a court in Florida ruled that this entire health care law was unconstitutional. There has been a separate ruling in Virginia prior to the beginning of this year. I will tell you that ruling in Florida yesterday is a second stake in the heart of this health care law. This government, this Senate, the House does not have a right to go into the homes of the people of my State of Wyoming or anywhere around the country and say to them: You must buy a product. You must purchase something. If the government can tell people they have to buy health insurance, where does it stop? That is why I am encouraged, as are Americans all across this country, when I see the ruling coming out of Florida. People inherently understand this is unconstitutional. The health care law even fails to meet the President's own promise. In Wyoming, we have a code of the West that says: If you give your word, keep it. The President promised this health care law would actually bring down the cost of care, he said by $2,500 a family. What are we seeing with insurance costs? The costs continue to go up and up and up. The President said: If you like what you have, you can keep it. That hasn't been true either. In terms of the insurance people have, they are losing what they have, if they like it. And even though several pages of the health care law may have implied that, when the Secretary of Health and Human Services came out with over 100 pages of regulations, it was clear that if you get your insurance through work-- big company, small company--the majority of Americans will not be able to keep the health insurance they have and that they like. A recent poll, released today, said that 58 percent of Americans would like to have this health care law repealed. The interesting thing about this was that this recent polling went further to say that when you poll people who have actually talked to a nurse or talked to a doctor or talked to a physician's assistant or an EMT or people involved in the health care area, even more of those people who have talked to a health care provider want this health care law repealed. As Nancy Pelosi said, first you have to pass it to find out what is in it. And as more and more people become aware of what is in it, more and more people want this health care law repealed. The mandates are excessive and they are expensive, and States--with Governors of both parties--are being impacted by these huge expenses. It is interesting. There was an article in Saturday's New York Times entitled: ``For Governors, Medicaid Looks Ripe for Slashing.'' That is Governors of both parties. Well, what is Medicaid? They are going to slash Medicaid. The article states: Hamstrung by Federal prohibitions against lowering Medicaid eligibility, governors from both parties are exercising their remaining options in proposing bone-deep cuts to the program. I have just heard other colleagues on the Senate floor talk about this huge expansion of Medicaid. That is the solution; that is the President's solution; that is the Democrats' solution; to cram more people onto Medicaid, a program initially designed for the poor, with low reimbursements rates and where over half of the doctors in the country won't see Medicaid patients. That is their solution. I listened to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle talk about coverage and talk about care and they use the words interchangeably. That is misleading to the American people. You can get a Medicaid card but that doesn't mean you can get in to see a doctor in the way that you might think. Half of the doctors don't want to see patients. Why? Because the reimbursement is so low. The New York Times article of Saturday speaks to U.S. aid running dry and States proposing Medicaid cuts, and the first person they cite is Governor Jerry Brown of California, a Democrat, and under him, Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat of New York. What does it say? It says: The shrinking of Medicaid programs, if approved by the state legislatures, would come at a tenuous moment for the Obama administration. Starting in 2014, the health care law calls for an enormous expansion of Medicaid eligibility that is expected to add 16 million beneficiaries by 2019. The health care law puts in place a program that will hire IRS agents to make sure people buy health insurance, but it doesn't pay to train the doctors and the nurses needed to take care of those patients. As the article goes on, it says: States have already cut payments to health care providers and scaled back benefits over the last few years, so these new proposed cuts are much more painful. I will tell you, the people of Wyoming want this law repealed. The chairman of our health committee in our State Senate--and I served under him for 5 years when I was a member of the Wyoming State Senate-- whose name is Charles Scott, has been in the State Senate over two decades and has studied this extensively. He had an article in the Caspar Star Tribune on January 30 speaking to this. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record this article.

Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that when I am finished with my remarks, the junior Senator from South Dakota be allowed to speak.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

Mr. BARRASSO

Mr. BARRASSO. It was a privilege for me to cosponsor this piece of legislation with the distinguished Senator from Colorado. My colleague Senator Enzi and I have long been advocates of allowing an additional opportunity for jobs and for economic development into the wonderful ski areas around Rocky Mountain West, which is the intent of this bill. It really is aimed at increasing summer activities so that a number of these locations, if you will, on Forest Service land can use that land for an extended season, which would then work toward full-time, year- round employment for the folks in those areas, putting in things such as zip lines and opportunities for recreational advancements to increase the amount of tourism, the amount of visitors to these wonderful places people like to enjoy. We think additional opportunities and enhancements would allow for additional employment. That is why Senator Enzi and I joined with Senator Udall in support of his efforts on this important piece of legislation.