Political Quotes

“Madam Chair, I yield myself the balance of my time. Madam Chair, I would say that the only education that would be really helpful on this bill would be to educate both employers and employees about all the shortcomings of this bill. Educating employers that they ought not to be discriminating against classes of workers and treating the rural, hardworking employees there at lower wages differently where they get an ICHRA policy that denies them preexisting conditions, that denies them the essential benefits under the Affordable Care Act, while the folks in the city in management get treated differently--they get a concierge kind of treatment that is not available to the rural workers. Just educating about this bill, which allows that discrimination, would not accomplish much of anything. I think what we are going to see with this kind of legislation is more and more workers in rural areas, as well as urban areas, who face discrimination and who face great medical debt because these plans are so weak. They are junk insurance that will deny the benefits that most people need. Educating about them, if truthful education, if not the kind of deception that is buried in this bill, educating about them will only tell people the limitations and the shortcomings. Otherwise, it will be a kind of education that covers up, as this bill does, the great harm that is being done in denying folks access to a family physician with the protection that is there.…”