John Hickenlooper: “I speak today to echo the sentiments of my fellow Members of the caucus. This is a moment where, at least in Colorado…”

“I speak today to echo the sentiments of my fellow Members of the caucus. This is a moment where, at least in Colorado, we hear stories every day of people faced with the challenge of whether to pay their rent or to make sure they maintain their healthcare, people who have preexisting medical conditions that are worried that if they go off their healthcare now, they might be pushed into a circumstance where they can only receive attention in emergency room situations, defeating the purpose of their treatments. By going forward and taking a 1-year extension, nothing new, but just a 1-year extension, we allow all those people in Colorado and across the country to sort through their healthcare issues, to reequilibrate, and to make sure that they are not left out in the cold. And I think that is the key here. We are looking at tens of millions of people that will either lose their healthcare or have dramatically significant increases in the cost of their premiums if we do nothing. So I hope that we can come together and move forward with this clean CR with the extension of the subsidized tax credit for the ACA. I yield the floor.”