Lois Capps: “I thank my colleague for yielding. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this reckless bill. I cannot count the…”

“I thank my colleague for yielding. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this reckless bill. I cannot count the number of times Members on both sides of this aisle have decried shortages in the primary care workforce of our communities, and working, often in a bipartisan manner, to develop ways to increase the primary care ranks. Yet today, the next victim in the Republican obsession with repealing the Affordable Care Act is a program that does deal with these shortages. It increases our primary care physician ranks, and trains them with special expertise in serving the community. The bill before us would defund this program, taking many qualified Americans out of the primary care workforce before they even have an opportunity to join it. Moreover, cutting these training programs would also affect already existing jobs at the 11 community-based entities that have already expanded their programs to train these new doctors. Taking away this funding will force possible layoffs and have a chilling effect on other sites developing this type of program. Yes, it is paid for through mandatory funding. But that is not unheard of or even unusual. In fact, the federally funded Graduate Medical Education program, which has had measured success in strengthening our health care workforce, is a mandatory spending program. The program the Republicans are trying to cut today is simply a complement to this GME program, focused on community-based care and prevention. The choice on H.R.…”