Testimony by state Insurance Commissioners and governors from across the country. Well start with shoons commissioners from oklahoma, washington, tennessee and alaska. The Senate Committee on Health Education and pensions will please come to ord order. In the individual Health Insurance market for 2018. We have five state Insurance Commissioners. Thank you for coming from long distances some of you to be with us to give your testimony on how to help the 18 million americans in the individual Insurance Market. To give a idea of how many people are interested in this, snar murray and i invited senators who were not on our committee, which has about a quarter of the senate is on this committee, to come to a coffee with the five commissioners that weve just completed for a hour. We had 31 senators there. So thats remarkable level of interest. Senator murray and i will have a Opening Statement then introduce our five witnesses. After their testimony, senators will have a opportunity to ask
That has been around for about a month now. Rick santorum is going to tell you how history is on our side. Ron johnson will talk about numbers because that is what he does and dean heller will tell you about how this is a good deal for nevada and the country as a whole. I will start with this proposition. If you leave repealing and replacing obamacare is a good idea, this is your best and only happen. O make it Everything Else has failed except this approach, which will work if we get behind it. If you want a singlepayer Health Care System, this is your worst nightmare. Ends yourders, this dream of a singlepayer Health Care System for america. We need people on board now to stop what i think is inevitable if we fail, which is singlepayer health care for all which is the end of quality and the end of a sustainable federal budget. There are four three choices. Care, or ourrnie bill. That is where we are our. Count me out for propping up obamacare. Hell no to bernie care. Count me in for
Talk about the drivers of this. Who are the two senators, what are they interested in. The republican senators working on this plan are built cassidy and lindsey graham. Lindsey graham and him started working on this plan earlier this summer. Looking they were working to overhaul Affordable Care act in july and started coming up with this pla plan. They officially rolled out there updated legislation last week. This girl would take the funding to help people afford insurance and outofpocket payments and medicaidge expansion, put it all into a general fund. Thats what were looking at. Talk a little bit about why they think the blockwa grant system is the way to go. You give the state money. This would be a really big change in terms of how healthcare is funded, going from federal government, state government, the senators are saying federalism is the way to go, give people the chance to really decide whats going on in healthcare or that sort of how theyre looking at the. You talk about
She covers health care in that. Talk about the drivers of this. Who are the two senators, what are they interested in and tell us about the legislation . Guest the republican senators working on the plan are bill cassidy of louisiana and Lindsey Graham of south carolina. Bill cassidy was a physician before coming to congress. Lindsey graham and him started working early in the summer around when Senate Republicans were looking to overhaul in july, they started coming up with this plan. Saying if we could get to congress, we will conference, they will do this plan. This bill would take effectively starting in 2020, the funding for the Affordable Care act. ,he funding goes to tax credits cautionary payments to help people afford outofpocket payments, put it all into a general fund and then block grant that to states based on different formulas to determine how much each state would get under their program. That is what we are looking at. Potentially a vote as soon as next week. Host talk
Sen. Hatch we are getting some interesting testimony, but it is not going to the problems that we have here in the senate. We will just have to see what happens. Senator wyden has a few more questions to ask and then that will be it. Sen. Wyden mr. Chairman, i will and again,id man these are the kinds of questions that you and i agree should be asked at this hearing. Sen. Hatch sure you reared sen. Wyden let us talk about flexibility, put into context of the nation nationss Senior Citizens to read i watched all of these older people as a director of the center raise their families, build our communities, but growing old in america costs a lot of money so today, Senior Citizens have a guarantee that medicaid is going to cover the cost of nursing home care. This is hugely important because medicaid picks up the bill for two out of three Senior Citizens in Nursing Homes in america. That is a guarantee for nearly millions of older people. This proposal, that Graham Cassidy proposal, i call