Default Prevention Act of 2013 - Motion to Proceed - Continued

Floor Speech

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, it has now been 2 weeks since the launch of the insurance exchanges that were created by President Obama's health care law. After 2 weeks of delays, error messages, things the President calls glitches, the American people are united in saying that this is what a train wreck looks like. A recent poll by the Associated Press found that only 7 percent of Americans say this rollout has gone either very well or extremely well. The Obama administration continues to say the problems were just because of too many people trying to check out the Web site the first day.

I bring to the floor the front page of Sunday's New York Times, Sunday, October 13, now 13 days into the exchange, with the headline above the fold, front page on Sunday: ``From the Start, Signs of Trouble at Health Portal. Many Deadlines Missed. Web Site Problems May Imperil Finances of Insurance Market.'' This is a front-page story. It continues inside the paper. It says:

In March, Henry Chao, the chief digital architect for the Obama administration's new online insurance marketplace, told industry executives that he was deeply worried about the Web site's debut. ``Let's just make sure it's not a third-world experience,'' he told them.

Two weeks after the rollout, few would say his hopes were realized.

For the past 12 days, a system costing more than $400 million and billed as a one-stop click-and-go hub for citizens seeking health insurance has thwarted the efforts of millions to simply log in. The growing national outcry has deeply embarrassed the White House, which has refused to say how many people have enrolled through the federal exchange.

Even some supporters of the Affordable Care Act worry that the flaws in the system, if not quickly fixed, could threaten the fiscal health of the insurance initiative, which depends on throngs of customers to spread the risk and keep prices low.

``These are not glitches,'' said an insurance executive who has participated in many conference calls on the federal exchange. Like many people interviewed for this article, the executive spoke on the condition of anonymity, saying he did not wish to alienate the federal officials with whom he works. ``The extent of the problems is pretty enormous. At the end of our calls, people say, `It's awful, just awful.' ''

At the time, the President of the United States--he and I talked about this directly face to face on Friday at the White House. He said we just have a problem with the cash register. I would say this is a Web site with major flaws. It goes way beyond the cash register.

One online database programmer told CBS News:

It wasn't designed well, it wasn't implemented well, and it looks like nobody tested it.

That is from a computer expert who says he supports the law but the Web site needs a complete overhaul.

I would be ashamed and embarrassed if my organization delivered something like that.

Remember, they spent $400 million of hard-earned taxpayer dollars. This guy says he would be ashamed and embarrassed to deliver something as bad as the Obama health care exchange.

I think the Obama administration should be embarrassed about the whole law. The law wasn't designed well, hasn't been implemented well, and it looks as if nobody tested it. The problems we have seen are not just first-day glitches. The problems have continued. People still cannot sign up easily. It is still not as easy to use as Amazon. Remember the President of the United States promised it would be as easy to use as amazon.com. Why are there problems 2 weeks later?

The CEO of Aetna Insurance said yesterday--this is 2 weeks into it. He said:

There's so much wrong, you just don't know what's broken until you get a lot more of it fixed.

We still have no idea how many people have been able to enroll successfully. What is the Obama administration continuing to hide?

Wolf Blitzer came out last week on CNN and said:

If they weren't fully ready, they should accept the advice the Republicans are giving them, delay it for a year, get it ready, and make sure it works.

Even Jon Stewart was asking why the Obama administration gave a 1-year delay to big businesses but not to the American people. Mr. President, if you are the Obama White House, when you have lost Jon Stewart, you know things are not going well.

The problems do not end with the media or professional comedians. A Democratic Member of the House who actually voted for the health care law called the launch of the exchanges ``excruciatingly frustrating.'' Robert Gibbs, President Obama's former Press Secretary, said yesterday:

I hope they fire some people who were in charge of making sure that this thing was supposed to work.

The biggest cheerleaders for the President's health care law are now turning against it, the American people do not like it, and people are not buying the administration's excuses for why it has failed. This is, of course, bad for the President, but the American people have even bigger problems, and that is what we should be really focused on.

The White House is worried about how this looks from a PR standpoint. We should also be talking about the real harm this health care law is doing to hard-working Americans and their families and their jobs and their paychecks. Many of them are going to lose their doctors--doctors who are not included in the insurance plans sold in the exchanges. Many are already seeing that their premiums are going up because of all the Washington mandates.

Remember the President and his promises in passing this health care law? That is not what the people are seeing today. One mother told a TV station in Allentown, PA, that when she went to sign up on the Web site, she was told her premium would be almost $950 for her family. That is $765 more than she pays now. She told the station, ``It would take food out of our mouths to be able to afford this coverage.'' This is what the President of the United States and Democrats in this body have foisted on the American people.

People are finding that not just the premiums are going up, but many of their other health care costs are also higher.

The Chicago Tribune had this headline on Sunday:

Obamacare deductibles may cause sticker shock. Insurance companies are requiring higher out-of-pocket expenses to pay for complying with new rules.

Expenses to pay for complying with rules--not expenses to give you health care, not expenses to keep you healthy, not expenses to prevent injury or illness, but expenses to pay for complying with the rules. That is the Chicago Tribune, the President's hometown newspaper.

As if all that weren't bad enough, the administration is still insisting it is going to fine people who don't have insurance, even though people can't sign up on the ObamaCare Web site successfully. The administration was saying that this is a long process and people have until the end of March of next year to enroll in the exchanges, but even that changed last week. Now it turns out people will actually have to sign up 6 weeks earlier than that--by Valentine's Day--or pay the tax penalty. What we are looking at is a tax penalty at 1 percent of income or $95, whichever is greater that first year. That could be a sizable amount of money for some families who thought they were going to get affordable insurance under the President's health care law because that's what the President promised them. He stood in Congress and told the American people that. He stood in front of groups all around the country, and the American people feel misled and deceived. All of this frustration, expense, stress, and pain was all avoidable.

Democrats in Congress and President Obama need to swallow their pride. They need to admit that the problems with the health care law are not limited to a bad Web site. The problems with the health care law run much deeper, and they are only going to get much worse. We must do something to stop this terrible law from doing more damage to people's jobs, their care, and our country.

The President will be held to the promises he made as recently as 2 1/2 weeks ago: If people like their doctors, they can keep their doctor, the cost will be less than a cell phone bill, and that it will be easier to use than amazon.com.

This health care law has failed miserably. We needed health care reform so people could get the care they need from a doctor they choose at lower costs. They have not gotten it. It is time to repeal and replace this terrible health care law.

I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source