Bringing America Back to its Roots
Floor Speech
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Mr. BURLISON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding, and I thank him for his passion and leadership on this topic and many others.
Mr. Speaker, today, I rise to address one of the most urgent issues facing the American family today, which is healthcare affordability. Under the Biden administration, inflation surged to levels that we haven't seen in decades, in generations, and healthcare costs rose right along with it, driving premiums, deductibles.
Out-of-pocket expenses became higher and higher for families across this country. Whether you are in an employer-sponsored plan or an individual market, it doesn't matter. The entire thing has been destroyed by the Democratic Party and their schemes.
For years, Washington has told the American people that if we just spend more, if we just mandate more, if we just regulate more, then healthcare will somehow become cheaper. It will become simpler and more humane. That promise clearly has failed in a spectacular way. We are watching it fail and go down in flames as we speak.
The Affordable Care Act was sold as a solution. It has locked families instead into a system where premiums keep rising and deductibles keep climbing, networks shrink, and patients are left with coverage that they can't even use and bills that they can't even predict. There is no transparency in the costs of the healthcare that they are receiving.
Let's be honest about where we are right now. Healthcare now consumes one-fifth of our entire economy. Hospital prices have risen three times faster than the awful inflation that we have been experiencing as a mean.
Insurance premiums have soared, yet patients still struggle to see their doctor. They still wait weeks, if not months, for an appointment. They still face surprise bills even when they follow all the rules.
This didn't happen by accident. Washington inflated the demand with subsidies and mandates while simultaneously choking off the supply through regulation, licensing barriers, and protection of entrenched interests. When government pours taxpayer dollars into a system that restricts competition, prices rise, efficiency collapses, and accountability disappears.
Through it all, the one group that was systematically excluded from decisionmaking is the patients themselves. That is the fundamental flaw of this current system. Americans are not allowed to control their own healthcare dollars. Instead, those dollars are routed through insurers, employers, and Federal agencies that never feel the pain of the cost and never face the consequences or have to deal with the time restraints.
Mr. Speaker, when you don't control the money, you don't control the choices. Contrary to the claim that, as my colleague from Texas has mentioned, we don't have any ideas, that is not at all the case. There have been multiple bills that have been sponsored year after year by thought leaders like the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), yet they haven't come to the floor for a vote. They haven't been given ample opportunity.
I am glad to see that now there is an appetite for this discussion because this House is already filled with serious, actionable reforms that give Americans real options beyond ObamaCare.
I recently cosigned a letter by Representative Biggs that highlighted 14 distinct healthcare reform bills that are out there, all of which present much better, more affordable solutions than the current disaster that we are facing with ObamaCare.
That is why I am promoting a new framework that is called MAHA, Make America Healthy Again, a patient-centered alternative that restores choice, transparency, and affordability without expanding government control or forcing anyone to give up their current coverage.
MAHA is built on two simple ideas.
First, MAHA accounts are modern, flexible, tax-free health accounts that put individuals and families back in charge of their healthcare spending. In essence, this is following through on the things that our President has truthed. Stop giving the money to the insurance companies. Give the money to the people.
These accounts allow for Americans to save and spend their own money on the care that they actually choose, the insurance premiums that they want to pay, the direct primary care, long-term care, and wellness expenses like healthy food and fitness. Imagine encouraging Americans to take their pretax dollars and go buy the healthy food that will sustain their families.
The unused funds roll over. Contributions will grow tax-free within these accounts. Families can even help a neighbor in need through direct, tax-advantaged charitable support.
This isn't about micromanagement from Washington. It is about restoring personal responsibility and real purchasing power.
The second part of MAHA is the insurance, which will be a new, affordable insurance option that is paired with these accounts that emphasize transparency, competition, and catastrophic protection, rather than all the bloated mandates.
These plans eliminate unnecessary requirements that have been proven to fail and drive up costs in ObamaCare. It will cap excessive provider pricing, expand access to telehealth and workforce reforms, and guarantee coverage without annual or lifetime limits.
Together, the MAHA accounts and MAHA insurance offer something that the Affordable Care Act never did: a real alternative.
Let's be clear: This does not force anyone to abandon their current coverage. If you like the crappy ACA ObamaCare plan that you currently have, you can keep it, but Americans deserve another option, one that treats them like an adult, not line items in a Federal spreadsheet.
Mr. Speaker, the American people are tired of being told that confusion is inevitable, that high costs are unavoidable, and that Washington knows better than they do. They are tired of a system that protects insurers, institutions, and lobbyists while families struggle to make ends meet.
Give the people control over their healthcare dollars. It is not a radical concept. It is how markets work. It is how innovation happens. It is how costs come down.
The choice is simple. We can continue doubling down on a failing system that promises coverage but little care, or we can offer Americans a new path, one grounded in freedom, responsibility, and trust in the people that we serve.
I want to make this very clear, Mr. Speaker: The American people don't want Republicans to do half measures or to tinker around the edges. They don't want excuses. They want leadership, and they want bold action. They want politicians to stop writing blank checks for a broken system and finally deliver the kind of transformative healthcare solutions that this country and these people deserve. Anything less borders on political malfeasance.
I thank my colleague from Texas for allowing me this time to speak.
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Mr. BURLISON. Will the gentleman yield?
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Mr. BURLISON. Right.
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Mr. BURLISON. Absolutely. Any kind of reform that we are looking at, if it doesn't include that as the core engine, we are not getting anywhere.
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Mr. BURLISON. Absolutely. I mean, when you give the choice back to the people, suddenly the doctors are going to start paying attention, as well.
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Mr. BURLISON. They are going to--when people ask, what does this cost? They are going to have to answer for it right then and there.
If they can't answer for it, guess what? When you have the choice, you can walk away. You can go to the next doctor. You can go down the street until people start providing the pricing. That will force transparency.
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Mr. BURLISON. No.
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Mr. BURLISON. Yes.
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Mr. BURLISON. Correct. In fact, the swampy thing to do and what you would expect this town to normally do is to tinker with those things--
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Mr. BURLISON.--and do what the conventional thought is before. Let's tinker with PBMs. Let's tinker with this account.
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Mr. BURLISON. Right? The end result will be less choice for patients and higher costs. Even with PBMs, it will raise premiums.
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Mr. BURLISON. No.
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Mr. BURLISON. Absolutely.
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Mr. BURLISON. Thank you for your leadership.
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