Servicemembers Home Ownership Tax Act Of 2009 - Resumed

Floor Speech

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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I do not see the Senator from Michigan on the Senate floor. I hope she will not be upset if I go first. I had spoken to her earlier about a 10-minute statement, and she is to have a 10-minute statement, as well, relative to this managers' amendment.

We just spent the last 7 1/2 or 8 hours having the clerks dutifully read this 383-page amendment. During that period of time, many of us have had a chance to read it ourselves. We have had staff explain it to us, and for those who are wondering what has happened, we can tell them the following.

Originally, we offered this bill--2,074 pages--on health care reform. It was offered by Senator REID, after a merger of the bills created by the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee as well as the Finance Committee. Then an effort was made to perfect this bill and address some other provisions that were not included. That effort was underway for a lengthy period of time because the Congressional Budget Office had to look at each suggestion to see whether it had an impact on the cost of the bill or the goal of the bill, which is to make health insurance more affordable.

Finally, the Congressional Budget Office has given its report--not in its entirety--but at least its preliminary report, and the news is very encouraging. Many of my colleagues come to the floor--the Senator from Oklahoma, who will speak after Senator STABENOW and I--and talked about our Nation's deficit. It is appropriate that issue be raised and taken seriously.

But I hope the Senator from Oklahoma and others who raise that issue will acknowledge something; this health care reform bill, as amended, is the greatest deficit reduction bill in the history of the United States. We have now been told by the Congressional Budget Office this bill will not only reduce our deficit over the next 10 years by over $130 billion, but in the following 10 years, their new calculation is it will reduce the deficit of the United States up to $1.3 trillion. How does it achieve this? It achieves this by achieving the goal of this bill: to bring down the increase in costs in health care.

The Congressional Budget Office tells us--and this is an independent group that looks at these things--we are achieving our goal to start bringing down the cost of health care in America. For those who will come to the floor and make speeches about our deficit and debt, please give credit where it is due. This bill will do more to reduce the deficit than anything ever proposed in Congress.

The second thing I wish to say is the basics of this bill remain. At the end of the day, 94 percent of the people in America will have health insurance, the highest percentage insured in our history. Thirty-one million uninsured Americans will have health insurance because of this legislation.

In addition to bringing down the costs of medical care and health insurance, in addition to extending the protection of insurance to over 30 million Americans currently uninsured, this bill will also provide protections to individuals against discrimination by health insurance companies. The new amendment which has been introduced today goes even further than the original bill. I think it will be a source of great consolation to many families across America to know this new amendment will say, in a very brief period of time, that every child under the age of 18 will be entitled to health insurance regardless of preexisting conditions. That is an amazing statement. It is an incredible statement. It says we are going to move forward quickly on this protection of the bill to eliminate the discrimination against people because of preexisting conditions and we will start with those under the age of 18 and do it in short order. That, to me, is a dramatic change.

Then, it says health insurance companies are now going to have to assert that the premiums collected are actually used to pay medical expenses. We will require of them that the medical loss ratio of certain companies be 80 percent and others up to 85 percent, which means the money collected in premiums--that money, up to 85 percent--has to be spent on actual medical expenses. That reduces the amount of money for these health insurance companies to spend on advertising, on salaries, on bonuses, on clerical help to deny claims. It says: Focus the money on helping people or rebate the money to those who pay the premiums.

In addition to that, this bill is going to make certain, with this new amendment, that patient health insurers have to abide by patient protections; for example, that protect an individual's right to choose their own doctor; also, ensuring access to needed care and guaranteeing an opportunity to appeal any denial of coverage. This bill, with its new amendment, is going to offer alternatives that aren't available today. I look at all these things in the bill, and I think of the profound impact some of them will have.

One of the provisions in this bill is going to dramatically expand community health centers across America. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont has been credited with being the leader on this, and he should be. He has done an extraordinary job. What a legacy he will leave and this bill will create: 10,000 more clinics and health care centers across America providing primary care in towns large and small. Rural and underserved communities will have opportunities tomorrow they don't have today because of this.

In addition to these things, this bill expands the small business health care affordability tax credit. I am not going to go into depth on this because Senator Stabenow from Michigan has been our leader on that, and she will tell you how. To the critics on the other side of the aisle who say this bill raises taxes and doesn't help people: Wait until you hear from Senator Stabenow what this bill does for small businesses. It expands tax credits to small businesses so they can provide health insurance to their employees. What a breakthrough this will be for many businesses that can't afford to do it today.

We also have provisions in here to engage in more direct efforts to try to find ways to reduce medical malpractice and the lawsuits that follow. It is an aggressive effort to find ways to protect victims of medical malpractice and yet reduce any lawsuits which should not be filed to the lowest possible number.

This bill increases access to workplace wellness programs, something all of us believe is the way of the future.

Let me also tell my colleagues that this bill has a provision in it which I have included, and I thank the leadership for accepting, on congenital heart research. This is near and dear to me and my family. The problem we have
run into is many children born with congenital heart defects end up living into adulthood without the necessary surveillance to determine what is the best practice to keep them alive and healthy and comfortable. This is a very tiny part of this bill, but it is so important to so many families that we will finally have surveillance of these patients around America with congenital heart defects and find those therapies that work best, those surgeries that will succeed. It will bring peace of mind to a lot of families to know we are going to make this extra special effort with a birth defect which affects literally hundreds of thousands of Americans.

I think this bill has been improved by this amendment. I know the Senator from Oklahoma is going to speak about the issue of amendments. I wish to say for the record that this is the 20th day since we brought this bill to the floor. In the 20 days the Senate has been considering this bill, the Republican side of the aisle has offered four amendments to change the bill--four amendments in 20 days. They offered another six motions to send the bill back to committee and stop the deliberation on the Senate floor but only four substantive amendments. We have been promised over and over there would be a substitute amendment which is even better than ours. It has never been introduced by the Republican side of the aisle. It certainly has never been cleared with the Congressional Budget Office. If they had a better idea, where has it been for 20 days? The amendments which they offered, many of them, related directly to the Medicare Advantage Program.

I think they offered at least two of their four amendments to protect that program. It is a private health insurance program, heavily subsidized by the Federal Government and one that, frankly, is wasting dollars that should be spent to help people and expand their care under Medicare. They have tried, time and again, on behalf of these health insurance companies to continue the subsidy, but we know it is wasteful and we know there is a better expenditure.

So I would say to those who would complain now while here, we are almost out of time to offer amendments, where have you been? For 20 days, for almost 3 weeks, where have you been? Where have your amendments been? You had your chance. Your leadership could have brought them to the floor but, instead, we had six motions to commit--take the bill off the floor--instead of amendments that dealt with the basic substance of the bill.

I think we have a good bill, and I think we have reached the point where we should vote, have an up-or-down vote. The Senate has considered this for a year. We have no Republican alternative that has been cleared by the Congressional Budget Office that indicated it is a viable alternative, and now we should bring the one bill before us that can make a difference in America: make health care more affordable, expand its coverage to 94 percent of our people, give our families and individuals across America a chance to bargain effectively with health insurance companies that say no. That, to me, is a good bill.

The bill that has just been read on the floor has been posted on the Internet now for more than 4 hours. Go to Senate Democrats, take a look, you will find it, and when you do, you will find the original bill and this amendment. All of America will get a chance to read this bill in its entirety today, tomorrow, and Monday, before the vote is going to be taken as to whether we are going to proceed with this managers' amendment, 72 hours before there is a vote on Tuesday morning, so America will have a chance, as it should, because it is a critically important issue.

The last thing I wish to do--Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has consumed 10 minutes.

Mr. DURBIN. I ask unanimous consent for 1 minute.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?

Without objection, it is so ordered.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the CONGRESSIONAL RECORD an article written by Victoria Reggie Kennedy, which will be published tomorrow in the Washington Post Sunday edition. It is entitled, ``The moment Ted Kennedy would not want to lose.''

There are many things said here which we can expect, but the one paragraph I wish to read into the RECORD is as follows, from the wife of Senator Ted Kennedy:

Still, Ted knew that accomplishing reform would be difficult. If it were easy, he told me, it would have been done a long time ago. He predicted that as the Senate got closer to a vote, compromises would be necessary, coalitions would falter and many ardent supporters of reform would want to walk away. He hoped that they wouldn't do so. He knew from experience, he told me, that this kind of opportunity to enact health care reform wouldn't arise again for a generation.

This bill has been called many things. It is officially titled the ``Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.'' I am going to refer to it as ``Kennedy Care'' because Ted Kennedy, throughout his public career, cared deeply about this health care issue.

Our time is here, and in his name and in his memory, we need to pass this historic legislation.

I yield the floor.

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