Bobby Scott

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Pocan), a member of the Committee on Education and the Workforce.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Massachusetts (Ms. Clark), a member of the committee.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 30 seconds just to respond to the idea that our substitute was produced. I would apologize to the gentleman for having sprung the substitute on him. However, 2 legislative days after his bill was introduced, he scheduled a markup on the bill, so we produced a response to his bill in 2 legislative days. That is all the time we were allowed. We would have allowed hearings. We would have liked hearings on his bill and our bill, but that just wasn't to take place because of the rush to judgment. I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Fudge), the ranking member of the Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education Subcommittee.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, because this bill limits the amount of funding available, it moves money from low-income areas to wealthy areas, eliminates targeted funds for English learners and those with disabilities; it fails to set meaningful standards. A lot of organizations oppose the legislation, including business organizations, child advocacy groups, civil rights groups, the organizations supporting those with disabilities and health groups, including the Congressional Tri-Caucus; the Advocacy Institute; the Afterschool Alliance; the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee; the American Association of People With Disabilities; the American Association of University Women; the American Federation of Teachers; the American Foundation for the Blind; the Association of University Centers on Disabilities; Autism National Committee; Autistic Self Advocacy Network; the Center for American Progress; the Center for Law and Social Policy; the Children's Defense Fund; the Committee for Education Funding; the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities; the Council of the Great City Schools; the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates, Inc.; Democrats for Education Reform; Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund; Easter Seals; Education Post; Education Law Center; First Focus Campaign for Children; Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network; Human Rights Campaign; the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law; Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law; Leading Educators; the League of United Latin American Citizens; the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund; the NAACP; the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund; the National Association of School Psychologists; the National Center for Learning Disabilities; the National Council on Independent Living; the National Council on Teacher Quality; the National Center on Time & Learning; the National Congress of American Indians; the National Council of La Raza; the National Coalition for Public Education; the National Disability Rights Network; the National Down Syndrome Congress; the National Education Association; the National Urban League; the National Women's Law Center; Partners for Each and Every Child; the Poverty & Race Research Action Council; Public Advocates Inc.; Stand for Children; Southeast Asia Resource Action Center; TASH; Teach Plus; TNTP; the Education Trust; the United Negro College Fund; the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights; and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. They are all in opposition to this legislation. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Alabama (Ms. Sewell).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. I yield the gentlewoman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I just want to state for the record that graduation rates have been up since No Child Left Behind was passed. Black and Latino children are doing better, so it has been working, but we need to continue to improve. Mr. Chairman, I would like to read the Statement of Administration Policy, which speaks to the administration position on H.R. 5. The Statement of Administration Policy goes as follows: The administration strongly opposes H.R. 5, the Student Success Act, as approved by the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. Congress must act in a bipartisan way to reform the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 to help States prepare all children for college and careers by giving them flexibility from No Child Left Behind mandates. However, H.R. 5 represents a significant step backwards in the efforts to help all of the Nation's children and their families prepare for their futures. H.R. 5 abdicates the historic Federal role in elementary and secondary education of ensuring the educational progress of all of America's children, including children from low- income families, students with disabilities, English learners, and students of color. It fails to maintain the core expectation that States and school districts will take serious, sustained, and targeted actions when necessary to remedy achievement gaps and reform persistently low- performing schools. H.R. 5 fails to identify opportunity gaps or remedy inequities in access to the resources and supports students need to succeed, such as challenging academic courses, excellent teachers and principals, afterschool enrichment or expanded learning time, and other academic and nonacademic supports. Rather than investing more in schools, H.R. 5 would allow States to divert education funding away from the schools and students who need it the most through the so-called ``portability'' provision. The bill's caps on Federal education spending would lock in recent budget cuts for the rest of the decade, and the bill would allow funds currently required to be used for education to be used for other purposes, such as spending on sports stadiums or tax cuts for the wealthy. H.R. 5 fails to make critical investments for the Nation's students, including high-quality preschool for America's children, support for America's teachers and principals, and investment in innovative solutions for the public education system. The administration agrees on the need for high-quality statewide annual testing as required in H.R. 5, so parents and teachers know how children and schools are doing from year to year and to allow for consistent measurement of school and student performance across the State. However, this bill should do more to reduce redundant and unnecessary testing, such as asking States to limit the amount of time spent on standardized testing and requiring parental notification when testing is consuming too much classroom learning time. The administration opposes H.R. 5 in its current form for all of these reasons but particularly because it would deny Federal funds to the classrooms that need them the most and fails to assure parents that policymakers and educators will take action when students are not learning. If the President were presented with H.R. 5, his senior advisers would recommend that he veto the bill. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, how much time is remaining?

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, the Consortium for Citizens With Disabilities says: The Student Success Act does not fully support students with disabilities, and in fact, it creates incentives for schools and districts to take students with disabilities, unchecked, off the track from having equitable access to and achieving a regular high school diploma. Incidence data reflects that less than 1 percent of all students have the significant cognitive disabilities, which corresponds to about 10 percent of students with disabilities. Without this limitation, we fear that schools may inappropriately assign students to the alternative assessment. Data show assignment to these alternative assessments may lead to reduced access to the general curriculum and limit a student's access to earn a regular diploma. That is why the disability groups oppose the legislation. Mr. Chairman, I just want to end with a reminder that this limits the funding. It transfers money from low-income areas to high-income areas. That is not just urban areas. There are over 2,400 low-income rural districts that will lose about $150 million, or 15 percent, of their total allocation, under the current law. The legislation eliminates targeting for English learners and those with disabilities. Finally, it fails to set meaningful standards. For those reasons, we should join the administration in opposing H.R. 5, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I enter into the Record letters in opposition from the following organizations: the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Diabetes Association, and the American Public Health Association. February 3, 2015. House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Dear Representative: The House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on HR 596, which would repeal the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA). The AAFP urges Congress not to repeal this nearly 5-year-old health care reform law, but rather focus on how the measure can be revised to improve patient care and restrain health system costs. The ACA addresses several important persistent problems with the nation's delivery of health care. First of all, it has demonstrably improved access to health care. As the most recent Gallup poll of the uninsured shows, the uninsured rate in the fourth quarter of 2014 fell to 12.9 percent, which is the lowest since Gallup began measuring it. By comparison, 17.1 percent were uninsured at the end of 2013. This substantial decline in the uninsured rate in one year has been broadly felt since it was evident in all the demographic categories. Second, the ACA establishes critical insurance reforms to prevent abuses such as reducing or eliminating coverage due to preexisting conditions, or setting prohibitively high prices on the individual market based on health status. Third, it encourages innovation in health care delivery through extensive research performed by the CMS Innovation Center. As recently as last week, for example, CMS announced early results of the Comprehensive Primary Care Initiative which demonstrate significant cost reductions in the first year due to investments in primary care. Fourth, the ACA requires both Medicare and private health plans to cover preventive health services (without cost-sharing), which is a proven long-term strategy to improve health while reducing costs. There are elements of the ACA that cause the AAFP concern, including the poorly constructed Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB). Congress should carefully review these elements with an eye to improving them for patients, for physicians and other providers, and for taxpayers, generally. The AAFP will continue to offer you our support for such efforts. However, in the meantime, it is important to avoid the disruptions and turmoil that repeal of the ACA would cause. Sincerely, Reid B. Blackwelder, MD, FAAFP, Board Chair.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms. Adams).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I believe the gentleman from Alabama is prepared to close.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I rise in opposition to H.R. 596. As the new ranking member on the Committee on Education and the Workforce, I know that protecting access to affordable health care for America's workers and families is a high priority. Despite scare tactics and misinformation, the bottom line is that the Affordable Care Act is working. Perhaps those who want to repeal the Affordable Care Act have a short memory. It is important to remember why the Affordable Care Act was passed in the first place. Before the ACA, employer-provided coverage was shrinking. More and more employers were dropping coverage altogether. There were months in 2008 and 2009 when 14,000 people a day were losing their health insurance because employers were not providing it and because it was above their ability to pay. From 1999 to 2010, the cost of premiums for employer-provided health insurance increased by 138 percent while workers' earnings only went up around 40 percent. And those who were employed were often locked into their employment for fear of losing their health care insurance because even though they wanted to retire, they couldn't get insurance somewhere else, and so they were stuck in that job. Every American family with insurance had to pay a hidden tax of approximately $1,000 per family for the cost of paying for those without insurance who would go to the hospital and not pay, and so when they went to the hospital, they would have to pay a little extra. That little extra was about $1,000 per year for every family with insurance. This was the reality that American workers and their families faced before the passage of the Affordable Care Act. We should not go backwards. Today, thanks to the ACA, workers are enjoying the peace of mind that they have options. If employer-provided coverage is not available, they can enter the marketplace. If it is available, they have the security of new consumer protections such as the requirement that at least 80 percent of the premiums be spent on actual health care, not corporate jets and CEO bonuses. And we ended insurance practices such as caps on payments that would only pay so much overall and then you are on your own, or so much for your lifetime and then you are on your own. And cancelations where they could just arbitrarily cancel your insurance after you have paid premiums year after year. You get sick, and they check and just want to cancel your premium. Those abuses can no longer take place. Employers will also suffer under a repeal. In 2014, premiums for employer-provided health care grew at the lowest rate in 15 years. If the ACA is repealed, many employers could again be charged health- related premiums, so if they have a few sick employees, they will see their premiums skyrocket. The vast majority of large employers who provide health insurance to their employees may suffer an increase in premiums due to the return of the hidden tax, the cost shifting of uncompensated care. And when employees leave a job, they are on their own to get insurance, if they can, because there was a prohibition that they could deny people with preexisting conditions. So if you have a preexisting condition and leave your job, who knows what is going to happen. In addition, small employers would suffer since all small group market reforms, including rating reforms, would disappear. Small employers used to pay 18 percent more in premiums than large businesses, on average. ACA leveled the playing field so now they are paying rates like everybody else. If you repeal the Affordable Care Act, they are up another 18 percent, where it was before. Now we have heard all of the statistics: over 3 million uninsured young adults have access to health insurance through their parents' policies; 8 million senior citizens in the so-called Medicare doughnut hole have been getting relief and have saved billions. Twelve million more Americans have health insurance because of the Affordable Care Act. These numbers represent real people, and these real people would lose access to their benefits if the Affordable Care Act is repealed. Those trying to repeal the law should be honest to seniors about what would happen to their free preventive care in the absence of the Affordable Care Act. They should explain to young adults that repealing the law would kick them off their parents' policies. They would have to explain to millions of Americans who only have insurance because of the Affordable Care Act--many for the first time in their lives--why they will now have to go without coverage. And while the Republican majority continues to talk about repeal, we should be talking about the progress we have already made and how we can continue to move in the right direction. So when the Republicans talk about replacement of legislation, it is important to note that there is no meaningful replacement proposal on the table. Delaying the effective date of this repeal for 180 days does not make a meaningful replacement any more plausible or likely. This is the 56th attempt to repeal or undermine the Affordable Care Act. This is a distraction, and I hope the Republican majority will refocus efforts on real policy solutions for the American people, American families, and workers. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Polis).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I enter into the Record the following letters in opposition: one from the National Committee to Preserve Social Security & Medicare, another from Easter Seals, another from the AFL-CIO, and another from the SEIU. February 2, 2015. House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Dear Representative: On behalf of the millions of members and supporters of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, I urge you to oppose H.R. 596, a bill to repeal the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Repealing the Affordable Care Act (ACA) would be detrimental to Americans of all ages: It would undercut the ability of marketplace insurance plans to offer affordable health coverage to individuals, including those with pre- existing conditions. Repeal would mean that young adults could no longer count on remaining on their parents' insurance plans until age 26. In addition, the number of uninsured ``young seniors,'' aged 50-64, would increase, leaving them in poorer health by the time they are eligible for Medicare--thereby increasing Medicare's costs. Repealing the ACA would also eliminate many of that law's provisions that benefit Medicare beneficiaries today, including help with prescription drug costs and preventive screenings and wellness visits with no out-of pocket costs. In addition, the payment and delivery system reforms that are being implemented due to the ACA are slowing the rate of increase in health spending while improving the care that is being provided, especially care to people with multiple chronic conditions. Slowing the rate of increase in health spending has also lowered costs for beneficiaries--the Part B premium has stayed level for three years in a row--and is extending the solvency of the Part A trust fund. We oppose H. R. 596 because it interferes with the ability of marketplace insurance plans to offer affordable health coverage, and hurts millions of seniors who benefit from the Medicare improvements contained in the ACA. The National Committee strongly urges you to vote against this anti-senior legislation. Sincerely, Max Richtman, President and CEO.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Courtney).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.