Health Care

Click here for a recap of the passage of health care reform.

Click here to view the Health Care Reconciliation Bill.

Click here to view the CBO/JCT preliminary analysis of House health reform reconciliation proposal.

Click here to view the Senate-passed H.R. 3590, The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

In October, Speaker Pelosi unveiled a comprehensive health care bill, which unfortunately passed the House on November 7 by a vote of 220-215.  H.R. 3962, the Affordable Health Care for America Act expanded on slightly different versions of H.R. 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009 reported in July by the Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, and Education and Labor panels, each of which has jurisdiction over parts of a health care overhaul.

After months of meetings about possible changes to our health care delivery system with constituents and business leaders, as well as hosting town halls and roundtable discussions, I can say that the American public has clearly stated their opposition to this government takeover of health care.  I want to clearly state that I voted against the House-passed H.R. 3962.

The passage of the House health care bill set the stage for the Senate to begin debate.  However, they did not bring up H.R. 3962 for consideration, but rather H.R. 3590, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.  On December 23, by a vote of 60-39, the Senate agreed to invoke cloture, thus ending debate on the amended health care overhaul bill.  This bill was passed on Christmas Eve, by another vote of 60-39.

The 2,309 page reconciliation health care bill was released on Sunday, March 14.  My staff and I are currently in the midst of reading through this legislation.  We anticipate possible final floor action this week on the Senate measure and a companion reconciliation bill.  Remaining loose ends include adding a student loan overhaul bill, which was passed as H.R. 3221 in the House last year to the reconciliation bill.  This would shift the private loan industry to the government-backed direct loan program (FFEL–Direct loan).

This health care package is being rammed through Congress using special rules process that is extremely messy.  If passed, HR 3590 (senate passed bill) could be the law of the land by the weekend.  I WILL NOT SUPPORT this legislation.  Americans have voiced loud and clear that they do not want this version of health reform.