Suspending the Individual Mandate Penalty Law Equals Fairness Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlelady from Kansas for yielding and for her leadership on this bill that I am proud to cosponsor.

The SIMPLE Fairness Act is about just that, providing fairness for hardworking taxpayers. If you look at how the President's health care law is being implemented, Mr. Speaker, you have got the President literally saying he is going to give exemption after exemption after exemption to the political class, to the select few who have special interest protections here in Washington.

The President, by the way, has said: Big businesses can get exemptions from ObamaCare. The President has said: Insurance companies can get exemptions from ObamaCare.

But then, when it comes to hardworking taxpayers, families out there who are struggling under the weight of this law, the President says no, you can't have that same exemption that he has given to everybody else.

So what we are saying here, Mr. Speaker, is if these exemptions are good enough for big businesses and if these exemptions are good enough for insurance companies, shouldn't they also be good enough for hardworking taxpayers who are struggling in this bad economy that the President has given us and under the weight of this unworkable law, that the President himself is acknowledging is unworkable, by giving all these exemptions away to everybody else?

Now, if you look at the law, Mr. Speaker, the President doesn't have the legal authority to just waive a law--to literally take out a pen and change the law.

What the President does have is the ability to work with us in Congress in a bipartisan way, which when you look at the vote on this bill, it will be bipartisan in support of giving these hardworking taxpayers that same exemption.

But this law, ObamaCare, is built on a foundation of broken promises. If you like what you have, you can keep it, of course, is probably the most broken promise in political history; but there is more. The President said insurance costs will be lower. Insurance costs are higher for families.

The President even said he will meet with anybody who has a better idea. Well, we do have a better idea, Mr. Speaker. Over 120 Members of Congress, including medical doctors, have cosponsored the American Health Care Reform Act.

We took the President up on his promise, now almost 3 months ago, and the President has refused to fulfill that promise of meeting with anybody who has a better idea. He won't even sit down and talk with us about a better idea to put patients back in charge of health care.

There is a better way. We ought to treat people fairly. This bill does it. I urge adoption.

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