“The Republican leader loves to come to the floor once or twice a week to talk about how bad Obamacare is. And what I say to him is his constant attacks on Obamacare do not take away from the fact that there’s 20 million people who have health insurance today who didn’t have it six years ago.”
Washington, D.C. – Nevada Senator Harry Reid spoke on the Senate floor today to set the record straight on Republicans’ unfounded attacks on the Affordable Care Act. Below are his remarks:
The Republican leader loves to come to the floor once or twice a week to talk about how bad Obamacare is. And what I say to him is his constant attacks on Obamacare do not take away from the fact that there are 20 million people who have health insurance today who didn’t have it six years ago.
The senator from California came as the speech was being given by the Republican leader and said to me remind him on what’s going on in California. We love Obamacare. It’s working wonderfully. Millions of people in California have health insurance that didn’t have it before. And she reminded me that in those states where Republican governors have agreed to do Medicaid, it’s great. In fact, where states have expanded Medicaid, the rates are approaching 7 percent lower than other states.
Let’s not just look at California, let’s look at Nevada. We have a conservative Republican governor. Brian Sandoval is his name. I’ve learned to accept the fact that he’s doing a good job in spite of the fact that when running for governor, he beat my son. Brian Sandoval is a good person. He’s doing a good job as governor of the state of Nevada and was not worried about criticism he would receive by helping the people of the state of Nevada. He has Medicaid in the state of Nevada and rates there are some 70 percent lower had he not done this.
My friend, the Republican leader, complains about the few choices in Obamacare market places. Wow, that takes a lot of chutzpah to do that. Before Obamacare, people had no choice. The choice was either paying a lot – a whole lot – or not doing anything. Many people just skipped insurance or were denied coverage. They were willing to take their chances. Now, people can go to the marketplace. They have lots of choices. Twenty million people have health insurance they didn’t have before. There are many examples. My friend, the Republican leader, just ignores them.
Pre-existing conditions. Think about that. Prior to Obamacare, if you had a child who was born with a birth defect of some kind – you had a child that developed diabetes, you were an adult in a car accident or a women that had pre-existing conditions, you had to pay more for your health insurance – if you could even get some. Everyone seems to ignore the good that that’s come from Obamacare.
Eighty-five percent of the people in the marketplace get financial assistance in buying their coverage. An estimated 73 percent of HealthCare.gov consumers could still purchase a plan for less than $75 per month, even if all final rates were to increase by double digits in 2017. Obamacare is a signature issue of the Obama Administration. As President Obama announced yesterday, he’s very happy with what Obamacare has done for the American people but it should be made better and it could be made better so easily if we would have a little bit of cooperation from the Republicans. But we’re going to continue focusing on making sure that people understand how well it has worked.
