Rob Woodall: “I hope what I am getting ready to say, it turns out to be redundant, that we are going to hear it in the closings of…”

“I hope what I am getting ready to say, it turns out to be redundant, that we are going to hear it in the closings of both the gentlewoman from Florida and the gentleman from Texas. We talk about this preexisting conditions' bill today as if it is going to help with preexisting conditions. As we have discussed already, it is not. But the preexisting conditions issue is a very real issue. It is a very real issue for families all across the country, and it has been for a long time. And undeniably, elections were won and lost this past cycle over a preexisting conditions issue based on the misinformation around it. I don't know how we are advantaged as a community by continuing to perpetuate the misinformation. When we first tackled preexisting conditions in a serious way, we did it together in this institution. I know, because it was a gentleman from my State, Madam Speaker, Speaker Newt Gingrich, who was sitting in that chair at the time. It was 1996. Bill Clinton was sitting in the White House. Newt Gingrich was sitting here leading the United States House, and we came together, Republicans and Democrats, we passed the Health Insurance Affordability and Accountability Act that abolished preexisting condition worries for every single family with an ERISA-based plan. Those are the plans that the Federal Government controls. So what I mean, Madam Speaker, is that for every single plan the Federal Government had dominion over, we eliminated preexisting conditions.…”