Heidi Alexander: “I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Speaker, House Concurrent Resolution 35, if adopted, will add provisions to the continuing…”

“I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Speaker, House Concurrent Resolution 35, if adopted, will add provisions to the continuing resolution, H.R. 1473, to prohibit any funds in this act or any previous act from being used to implement the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Most importantly, the resolution will guarantee that our colleagues in the Senate will take an up-or-down vote on this important issue. I think we can agree that this is a vote that the American people have called for and is a vote that we owe the American public. Mr. Speaker, today the House approved an historic spending agreement that cuts nearly $40 billion in Federal spending. When signed into law, Congress will have achieved the first step in addressing our Nation's ballooning debt. Our economy still suffers from apathetic growth, and millions of individuals remain unemployed. At a time like today, when the Federal Government is running record deficits, coupled with significant unsustainable liabilities like Medicare and Medicaid, we simply cannot afford this $2.6 trillion new entitlement program. It only seems fair that a vote on the billions of dollars in both mandatory and discretionary money required to implement the health reform law is part of the discussion. I, along with my colleagues in the House, have long argued for the repeal of this law.…”