One of my sons, a husband, and wonderful father of two, came home last week to Petaluma from 6 1/2 weeks in the hospital. He has many, many, more weeks of recovery ahead of him, but I can tell you that this family that still has a huge challenge ahead of them would not have a chance without health care--the health care coverage that they have.
The bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act goes in precisely the wrong direction. Just when we should be strengthening the historic reform we passed last year, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to tear it apart. Have they never experienced another person that had the needs that my family has today--even if it wasn't in their family? Repeal--we know, would leave millions out in the cold, stripping them of access to affordable health coverage.
In fact, Blue Shield of California recently announced a rate increase of as much as 59%, 59%-- for some 200,000 policyholders. Does the majority not see the problem with run-away costs that are passed on to middle-class families already burdened by a deep recession? Do they want to return to the broken health care system that had people crying out for reform in the first place? The claim that cutting government spending is the most important of all flies in the face of the CBO that has concluded the repeal bill would add $230 billion to the nation’s debt by 2021.
Passing this bill would be a tragic mistake.