Making Continuing Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. CRUZ. Mr. President, 3 1/2 years ago, perhaps reasonable minds could have differed over whether ObamaCare would work. Perhaps reasonable minds could have differed over whether it would cripple the economy. Perhaps reasonable minds could have differed over whether it would be devastating to millions of Americans. Today, that is no longer the case.

Today, we have seen the impact of ObamaCare. We have seen what it is doing. ObamaCare is a train wreck. It is a nightmare, to use the word used by the lead Democratic author in the Senate, and a union leader who previously supported ObamaCare. ObamaCare is the single largest job killer in the country. ObamaCare is forcing Americans all over our Nation into part-time work, to working 29 hours a week or less.

ObamaCare is causing health insurance premiums to skyrocket all over this country. ObamaCare is jeopardizing the health care for millions of Americans, threatening that they will lose their health insurance altogether. It, quite simply, is not working.

Perhaps saddest of all, the Senate is not listening. The Senate Democrats are not listening to the millions of Americans who are being hurt by ObamaCare. If you are a young person right now coming out of school, and finding door after door closed to you because small businesses are not growing, because jobs are not there, because we have the lower labor force participation in decades, Senate Democrats are not listening to you.

If you are a single mom right now, perhaps waiting tables at a diner, and you are seeing your hours forcibly reduced to 29 hours a week--29 hours a week is not enough to feed your kids. But that is what ObamaCare is doing to you. Senate Democrats are not listening to you. If you are a recent immigrant trying to raise a young family, working hard and seeing your health insurance premiums skyrocket, and you are wondering how on Earth you are going to be able to pay these rising premiums while still meeting the needs and expense of your young family, Senate Democrats are not listening to you.

If you are retired, if you are a person with disabilities, getting notice from your insurance carrier that the policy is going to be dropped because of ObamaCare or if you are concerned that you will be getting notices--so many others across this country have been--Senate Democrats are not listening to you.

If you are married and on your spouse's health insurance, and you have received a notice like 15,000 employees at UPS recently received a notice, telling them that their spousal coverage was being dropped, that their husbands and wives were losing their health insurance because of ObamaCare, Senate Democrats are not listening to you.

If you are a union worker working hard to provide for your family to seek the American dream, and you are discovering that the health insurance that you liked, that you have worked for, that you have paid for, is going to be taken away from you because of ObamaCare, Senate Democrats are not listening to you.

Perhaps some might say, how could it be that this is happening? Surely Senate Democrats would listen to the American people if that sort of suffering were happening. Well, if you do not take my word for it, let me urge you to take the words of James Hoffa, president of the Teamsters. I would like to read a portion of a letter Mr. Hoffa wrote recently to Senate majority leader Harry Reid and House minority leader Nancy Pelosi.

Dear Leader Reid and Leader Pelosi: When you and the President sought our support for the Affordable Care Act, you pledged that if we liked the health plans we have now, we could keep them. Sadly, that promise is under threat. Right now, unless you and the Obama administration enact an equitable fix, ObamaCare will shatter not only our hard-earned benefits but destroy the foundation of the 40-hour work week that is the backbone of the American middle class.

That is not me speaking, that is James Hoffa, the president of the Teamsters.

Like millions of other Americans, our members are front-line workers in the American economy. We have been strong supporters of the notion that all Americans should have access to quality, affordable health care. We have also been strong supporters of you.

I would note this is addressed to Senate majority leader Harry Reid and House minority leader Nancy Pelosi.

In campaign after campaign we have put boots on the ground, gone door-to-door to get out the vote, run phone banks and raised money to secure this vision.

The vision of a Democratic majority in the Senate. So how is that Democratic majority in the Senate working out for union workers across the country? Well, the next sentence in this letter is:

Now this vision has come back to haunt us.

I would note this is the exact same sentiment I expressed a moment ago. Senate Democrats are not listening to you. The letter continues:

Time is running out. Congress wrote this law; we voted for you. We have a problem. You need to fix it. The unintended consequences of the ACA are severe. Perverse incentives are already creating nightmare scenarios:

Note that word ``nightmare'' which I started my remarks by quoting. That is not my word, that is the Teamsters describing ObamaCare. Indeed, the letter concludes by saying:

On behalf of the millions of working men and women we represent and the families they support, we can no longer stand silent in the face of the elements of the Affordable Care Act that will destroy the very health and wellbeing of our members along with millions of other hardworking Americans.

Let me note, No. 1, Mr. Hoffa says millions of working men and women. Not hundreds; not thousands; millions. What does Mr. Hoffa say is happening to those millions of working men and women? That their health care is being destroyed. Destroyed is the word he used. What answer do we get today from the Democrats in the Senate? Nothing.

President Obama has granted exemptions from this failed law to big business and to Members of Congress. So the friends of the administration do not have to bear the burden of the law's collapse, but hard-working Americans, those without lobbyists, without friends in the corridors of power, are getting no exemptions from Senate Democrats. That is wrong.

In roughly an hour, if Senators vote as they have announced publicly they intend to vote, this body will vote to put back, to restore the funding for ObamaCare and to gut the House continuing resolution. But the good news is, the process is not over. It is going to go back to the House of Representatives. I salute the House for having the courage to stand and fight and defund ObamaCare. I remain confident, hopeful, and optimistic that the House will stand their ground, will continue the fight, which means this issue is coming back to the Senate.

That is good news. That is good news, No. 1, for Republicans. It is unfortunate that there has been Republican division on this issue. When it comes back to the Senate after the House stands their ground yet again, we will have an opportunity for Republicans to come home, for Republicans to stand together. I very much hope the next time this issue is before this body in a few days, all 46 Republicans are united against ObamaCare and standing with the American people, that we listened to the American people the way Senate Democrats are not.

Let me tell you I hope also that it is not just 46 Republicans. Our friends on the Democratic side of the aisle go home to their States, they listen to their constituents. They are hearing the suffering from the men and women who elected them. It is not easy to disagree with your political party. But at the end of the day, what we are doing here is bigger than partisan politics. What we are doing here is fitting for 300 million Americans across this great country.

So I hope when this issue comes back, when the House stands their ground and sends it back to us, instead of just exercising brute political power, as this body is getting ready to do, I hope the Senate Democrats begin listening, that they begin listening to young people, that they begin listening to single moms, that they begin listening to immigrants, that they begin listening to people who are retired, people with disabilities, that they begin listening to married people, that they begin listening to union workers, all of whom are suffering under ObamaCare.

This is an opportunity for the Senate to return to the finest traditions of this body, where we listen to and fight for the American people. That has not happened in a long time. But I am very hopeful that we are in the process of seeing it begin to happen now.

I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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