Political Quotes

“I rise today to speak about my bipartisan legislation, the Competitive Health Insurance Reform Act, which I introduced with my colleague Senator Patrick Leahy. This is important legislation that will protect consumers from anticompetitive practices by repealing the outdated antitrust exemption for the health insurance industry. This bill has wide bipartisan support, as well as a strong history of near-unanimous congressional consensus, having passed the House of Representatives three times, most recently this September. In 1944, the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. South-Eastern Underwriters that the business of insurance was a form of interstate commerce. This meant that the health insurance industry would be subject to Federal antitrust laws under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. The insurance industry began raising uncertainties about whether this meant that States would no longer have authority to regulate insurance. When Congress acted to reaffirm this State authority, in the McCarran-Ferguson Act, the insurance industry managed to add a last-minute special-interest loophole that exempted the business of insurance from Federal antitrust laws. It has become clear that this antiquated exemption has effectively given insurance companies the power to collude to drive up prices, restrict competition, and deny consumers choice.…”