Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about the ongoing threat from the Trump administration to healthcare and the guaranteed protections that millions of American families depend upon.

President Trump has tried to pass repeal plans that would take people's healthcare away and allow insurance companies to charge more for people with preexisting health conditions or those insurance companies could deny them coverage altogether.

When that repeal plan failed to pass in the Senate in the summer of 2017, instead of working in a bipartisan way to lower healthcare costs, President Trump turned to truly sabotaging our healthcare system.

What do I mean by that?

The Trump administration made it harder for people to sign up for the Affordable Care Act coverage. They have done so by limiting the window of time when people can enroll. They have truly created instability in the healthcare market, and their sabotage has contributed to premium spikes that we have seen across the country, including in my home State of Wisconsin.

The Trump administration has even gone to court to support a lawsuit in order to overturn the Affordable Care Act completely, and that, of course, would include protections for people with preexisting health conditions. They have essentially gone into court to ask the court to strike down the Affordable Care Act. Now, if they were to succeed, insurance companies will again be able to deny coverage or charge much higher premiums for the more than 130 million Americans who have some sort of preexisting health condition. The number with preexisting health conditions includes some 2 million Wisconsinites.

What is the President's plan to protect people with preexisting health conditions? He doesn't have one, and I don't believe he ever will.

In fact, he has acted in just the opposite vein. This administration has expanded junk insurance plans that can deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions, and they don't have to cover essential services like prescription drugs or emergency room care or maternity care.

I ask my friends on the other side of the aisle to think about this for a moment. President Trump supports overturning the law that provides protections for people with preexisting health conditions at the same time he is expanding these junk plans that don't provide those very protections. If this isn't straight-up sabotage, I really don't know what is.

When I was 9 years old, I got sick. I was really sick. I was in the hospital for 3 months. Now, I recovered, but my family still struggled because I had been branded with the words ``preexisting health condition'' and I was denied insurance coverage.

That family and personal experience has driven my fight to make sure that every American has affordable and quality healthcare coverage.

Today, because of the Affordable Care Act, those with preexisting health conditions cannot be discriminated against. They can't be denied healthcare coverage, and they can't be charged discriminatory premiums.

I want to protect the guaranteed healthcare protections that so many millions of Americans now depend upon. I have introduced legislation along with my colleague Senator Doug Jones of Alabama to overturn the Trump administration's expansion of junk insurance plans.

The entire Senate Democratic caucus, including the two Independents who caucus with us, have supported this legislation. They have signed on to this bill. The Nation's top healthcare organizations, representing tens of thousands of doctors and physicians, and patients and medical students, and other health experts have supported this legislation and endorsed it. Anyone who says they support healthcare coverage for people with preexisting conditions should support my legislation. Unanimous Consent Request--S. 1556; that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; that the bill be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate.

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Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, I am certainly disappointed that my Republican colleagues have chosen to object to protecting people with preexisting conditions.

It is my contention that some of the very opposite impacts, because of these junk plans, are occurring than what my colleague has recited. In fact, I hardly consider them insurance plans. Many have argued that they are not worth the paper that they are written on. They don't cover many essential benefits. They are not required to cover people with preexisting health conditions. They can drop people. They can charge outrageous prices. What we found--and the reason that the Obama administration went from yearlong plans to 3-month plans--is that they saw the distortion in the markets. They saw that people who had believed that they might not get sick--healthy, often younger people-- were availing themselves of these plans, making the Affordable Care----

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Ms. BALDWIN. It may not be to the Senator's liking, but I was going to tell you about the plans that I read the fine print on from the State of Wisconsin. Now that these short-term plans are renewable for up to 3 years, in these junk plans, you can see the fine print. Many times they start with this: We will not cover a preexisting condition. Every single one of them refuses to cover maternity care. That means none of these junk plans cover that essential benefit. Most of them don't cover emergency room care. Most of them don't cover prescription drugs. So regardless of how the law impacts people who have other types of insurance, I feel strongly that these junk plans are very distorting of the market and not worth the paper they are written on for those who have chosen to take that route.

Last fall, we heard all my colleagues across the aisle say, often repeatedly, that they support protections for people with preexisting health conditions. Today I just offered an opportunity for Democrats and Republicans to come together to protect people's access to quality, affordable healthcare when they need it the most, but there was an objection.

I say to the American people that we must not lose sight of the fight right in front of us. We have a President who time after time has sabotaged our healthcare system, raised healthcare costs, and pushed these junk insurance plans that don't have to cover people with preexisting conditions. We have an administration that is asking a court to strike down the Affordable Care Act and its protections for people with preexisting conditions in their entirety.

The choice for the American people could not be more clear. We want to make things better, and my Republican colleagues refuse to join us in this effort, which would be to prevent this administration from making things worse.

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