Commerce, Justice, Science, Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, Interior, Environment, Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development Appropriations Act, 2020

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, so far, the 116th Congress has been full of a number of dubious measures, as I might characterize them, by our friends across the aisle as it relates to our healthcare system.

For starters, our Democratic colleagues in the Senate and the House and on the Presidential campaign trail are hailing Medicare for All as the gold standard for healthcare in America.

I was here during the debates over the Affordable Care Act, and I remember President Obama's saying, if you like your policy, you can keep it and that if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. Neither one of those proved to be correct and true. Yet, here, our Democratic colleagues have simply given up all pretense and have embraced a Medicare for All Program that would outlaw some 180 million Americans' private health insurance policies. In other words, the policy you get through your employer as part of the fringe benefits of your employment would no longer be available under Medicare for All. This is, of course, socialized medicine, which ensures long waits for substandard care.

Yes, it is true that I have heard some say: ``Well, it is Medicare for All. Who would want it?'' and others say: ``No. I am for the public option.'' Both of these are slippery slopes into a single-payer, socialized medicine healthcare system that will deny consumers the choices they might prefer to make for themselves rather than to leave the government to make those choices for them. Not only would this trigger a lot of disruption, it would also lead to sharp increases in taxes to fund this, roughly, $30 trillion pipedream.

Last month, Speaker Pelosi managed to take this debate on healthcare to the next level. It seems like controlling people's healthcare alone isn't enough. Now they want to run the drug industry too. Forget about choice. Forget about competition. Forget about innovation. One of the things that has characterized the American healthcare system is the lifesaving innovation of drugs. The Democrats want to now have the Federal Government determine what the formulary is, what drugs are available to you. They want to set the prices and ensure the bureaucrats rather than families are at the center of our healthcare system. They are churning out partisan healthcare bills, one after another, and taking their party further and further to the left with every move.

I would like to think, ultimately, cooler heads will prevail in the Senate, where we have been working on bipartisan bills to bring down healthcare costs. For example, the Senate's Judiciary, Finance, and HELP Committees have each passed bipartisan packages of bills to end surprise billing so as to create more transparency when it comes to pharmaceuticals and increased competition, but that doesn't mean this side of the Capitol is immune from some of the politics when it comes to our healthcare system.

Rather than following the Speaker's lead in introducing partisan bills, the Democratic leader in the Senate has taken a different tack, that of blocking bipartisan consensus bills. For example, there is a bill I introduced earlier this year with our colleague from Connecticut, Senator Blumenthal, to bring down skyrocketing drug prices. Senator Blumenthal is a Democrat, and I am a Republican, but contrary to what you may see in the media, that doesn't mean we can't talk to each other or work together in the best interests of our constituents.

Because Senator Blumenthal and I both sit on the Committee on the Judiciary, we have been looking at the price hikes that have been caused by people who game the patent system, specifically something called patent thicketing. Some drugmakers build a web of patents that is so intricate it is virtually impossible for competition to go to market even when the patent on the underlying drug has expired or will expire soon. They use these so-called patent thickets to hold competitors at bay and keep prices high for as long as possible.

This is something Senator Blumenthal and I are trying to stop through our bill, the Affordable Prescriptions for Patients Act. This legislation would disarm those patent thickets and streamline litigation by limiting the number of patents companies can use so competition can go to market sooner.

This legislation passed the Senate's Judiciary Committee in June without having a single member on either side of the aisle vote against it. It was unanimous, which is something that doesn't happen all that often in the Committee on the Judiciary. In the past, something with this level of support would have quickly sailed through the full Senate but not today, not on the minority leader's watch. According to a report in POLITICO, the minority leader is blocking this bipartisan bill.

With the House Democrats' obsession of impeaching the President and, apparently, their interest in accomplishing nothing else, the odds of bipartisan legislation getting done around here are getting slimmer and slimmer each day. Rather than seizing the opportunity to pass a bill that will provide relief to the folks we represent who struggle with the high costs of prescriptions, it is politics 24/7. I am disappointed in our colleagues' single-minded obsession with undoing the 2016 election and removing the President from office. One of the casualties of that, though, is the prevention of our being able to pass even bipartisan bills to help the American people, the people we represent.

I ask here, publicly today, for the minority leader to reconsider his decision of blocking this bipartisan piece of legislation.

I am afraid the vote our Democratic colleagues have just forced us to take this afternoon shows just how far they are willing to go to prove a point, even when the point is not well made, which leaves me with little optimism that the minority leader will have a change of heart.

As we have heard, the Affordable Care Act has what is known as State innovation waivers. That is part of what we voted on just a moment ago. It is important to reiterate that these innovation waivers, which were a part of the Affordable Care Act, enable States to waive some of the law's burdensome requirements in pursuit of finding alternative means of coverage. States can apply for these waivers to change how insurance subsidies are used, for example, and select a combination that better fits their States' and their citizens' needs. What works in a State as big as mine, with 28 million citizens, isn't, maybe, going to work in the same way as in a smaller State--North Dakota or Delaware.

Washington bureaucrats shouldn't be able to decide what best suits the needs of my constituents in Texas. That is why these waivers, which are part of the Affordable Care Act, are so important and why, last year, the administration gave the States more flexibility to tailor their insurance plans to suit their constituents' needs. This does not mean, as we have heard, that the States have an entirely free hand. It just gives them more flexibility to use Federal dollars where they are needed most. Unfortunately, our Democratic colleagues are opposed to these expanded innovation options.

They claim they forced this vote to repeal the rule because it puts patients' coverage for preexisting conditions at risk, but that is not true. Section No. 1332 does not allow States to waive ObamaCare's preexisting conditions' coverage. In fact, these waivers give States the ability to provide enhanced support for those with preexisting conditions and high healthcare costs. So far, 13 States have been approved for these waivers.

It is worth noting on this chart the 1332 waivers that have been issued this year. Colorado has seen a reduction in premiums by 16 percent; Delaware by 13 percent; Montana by 8 percent; North Dakota by a whopping 20 percent; and Rhode Island by 6 percent.

So with preexisting conditions covered, and with premiums actually going down, what is there to object to?

Well, our Democratic colleagues are simply waging a war against a problem that does not exist, but I guess if you say it often enough and loudly enough, some people, somewhere, may just believe that coverage of preexisting conditions is somehow a partisan issue. It is not. They are grasping at straws as their party unfortunately has gone further and further to the left on healthcare.

Well, 10 of the 13 States that received waivers are represented by at least one Democrat in the Senate. Why would you vote for a repeal of a rule consistent with existing law that would lower premiums for your constituents which would require coverage for preexisting conditions unless it is your good sense overcome by perhaps politics?

Our Democratic friends make it seem like coverage of preexisting conditions is a partisan issue when it is not. We all agree that patients with preexisting conditions should receive health coverage, period.

Earlier this year, I cosponsored a bill introduced by our friend, the Senator from North Carolina, Mr. Tillis, called the PROTECT Act, which would reaffirm our commitment that no American will ever be denied health coverage due to a preexisting condition. We believe that coverage for preexisting conditions shouldn't hang in the balance of a court decision. It would finally codify what every Member of this body says they agree with: That all Americans deserve access to health coverage, specifically to cover preexisting conditions.

All this rule by the Trump administration does is provide the States with the flexibility to cater to their citizens' healthcare needs, and there simply was no reason to overturn it, and we did not.

So I would encourage our colleagues to stop daydreaming about pie in the sky ideas like Medicare for All--simply unaffordable, absolutely unworkable--or a government-run pharmaceutical industry where the government sets the prices and says what drugs you or your family can get access to.

Quit trying to fight the President at every turn and every step he wants to make. Try to find places where we can work together, and let's do that by moving bipartisan legislation that will lower out-of-pocket costs for drugs and improve people's quality of life and standard of living.

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