Political Quotes

“I rise today with colleagues to talk about the vote we will cast tomorrow on extending Affordable Care Act premium tax credits. We missed an opportunity in June. In June, the reconciliation bill that was passed by the Senate contained $1 trillion of tax cuts for people who are in the 1 percent--the Nation's wealthiest, who didn't need a tax cut--but we refused to extend premium tax credits so that 20-plus million Americans could afford health insurance. Just by order of magnitude, we could have extended the tax credits as is for 10 years at a cost of $350 billion. That is not inexpensive, but it is one-third of the cost of the tax credits that we handed away to the wealthiest 1 percent of people in this country, who don't need it. I can assure you that my Virginians need these ACA premium tax credits. If we do not extend the tax credits in the simple bill the Democrats have on the floor tomorrow, the best estimates are that 94,000 Virginians will lose their enrollment in health insurance through our ACA Marketplace. Of those 94,000, 50,000 will go uninsured. They won't be able to find any other insurance. Because the Affordable Care Act carries with it funding for States, Virginia stands to lose $295 million in Federal funding, have a significant hit of more than $400 million to the State's gross domestic product, lose about 3,500 jobs, and also lose around $31 million in State and local tax revenue.”