quorum call:

quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from wyoming. mr. barrasso: i ask that the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection, the quorum call be

suspended. mr. barrasso: i ask the privileges of the floor be immigrant granted to brian golden during the pend eans of today's session, december 12, 2013. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. barrasso: the matter before us is a nominee to be commissioner of the equal employment opportunity commission for a term expiring july of 2018. this nominee has been asked to serve as a commissioner by president obama and was confirmed by the senate by a voice vote december,le twe 2010 for a term ending july of 2013. while her term expired at that day she can continue to serve until the end of this congressional session, until december, 2013. so she is still in the position continuing to serve. i've gone through her entire biography and by have some questions if i were to have an opportunity to visit as a senator today with this nominee

to be commissioner of the equal employment opportunity commission. and i'd like to ask the nominee if she is willing to forgo federal employee insurance which she currently has to go onto the insurance now provided or forced upon most of america through the president's health care law. would she who is now seeking nomination and seeking confirmation be willing to do what americans are being asked all around the country to do, people who have received letters that said sorry, your insurance isn't good enough, sorry, you can't keep your insurance regardless of what the president may have promised, what would this nominee say is the president's health care law good enough for her? is what the president is promising to americans good enough for her, i shouldn't say promising, offering if they can get it depending on whether the

web site is working on a given day, whether they can afford it, whether they want it, whether it works for them, is should this something this nominee would think is a good idea for her. i would like to ask her views on employers because, of course, she is in a position as commissioner of the equal employment opportunity commission, ask the nominee regarding her view of employers forced to change health care plans offered to their employees as a result of the democrat mandated and passed on party-line votes obama health care law. what are her views on employers being forced to change health care plans offered to employees because of what this senate body did. idle liernglike to ask the nominee if she believes that an employer who requires some or her of her employees to join the exchange is okay about exempting

other employees if that would be a violation of the equal employment up opportunity commission laws, does she believe that an employer who requires some of his employees to join the exchange while exempting others, would that be a violation of the laws because that's what the majority leader of the united states senate has done. does the law not apply to the majority leader? we've heard his explanation, i know "the washington post" gave him three pinocchios meaning there is a kernel amount of untruth in his explanation but what about this nominee that's before us today? i'd like the nominee to hear her thoughts regarding whether or not people in power should have the rights to change rules at any time in a matter that restricts the rights of those that the rules were intended to protect. because that's what's happened on this floor of the united states senate in the last couple of weeks.

a group broke the rules to change the rules, broke the rules to change the rules, in a way that has denied the minority rights that had been protected for centuries. so i'd be interested in hearing what the nominee had to say about that. it's interesting because the facts that have been brought forth on the floor by the senate majority leader regarding the filibuster has actually been described as fraudulent. democrats filibuster fraud on november 1, majority leader harry reid broke his promise not to employ the nuclear option when he and senate democrats limb flated in filibuster on nominations they did so based on what senator hatch has described as filibuster fraud. orrin hatch, long standing

member of this body, knows the rules, did it to divert attention away from this obamacare nightmare. people faced with higher premiums, canceled coverage, people finding out they can't keep their doctor, fraud and identity theft which is going on even until today, and i think is going to continue and get worse in the future and higher co-pays and deductibles. mr. president, one of our senate colleagues his staffer was trying to sign up for insurance on monday, on a web site that pretty much looked identity -- identical to the government web site, what he found is it took him to a page and they asked for his bank account number and his pin number. i think everyone agrees that is not part of the health care web site, but that easily went from something -- this is a member who works in the united states senate, works as a staff member for one of the members of this body and found himself taken

through the computer, broken i should say, the broken web site, easily, easy to maneuver and manipulate, took him to a place asking him for his bank account number and pin number. he calmed the help line, spent several hours on hold waiting to talk to people and they said just get off of that web site. i think folks he was talking to seemed even surprised to know that logged in what he felt was the -- looked identical to the government web site but yet there is the problem there. so what we're seeing is i believe an effort to divert attention away from the obamacare nightmare and ensure that the circuit court of appeals will be a rubber stamp for the president's agenda. and what has happened? well, "the washington post" looked at the comments by the senate majority leader who when

the senate majority leader on november 21 said in the history of the republic there have been 168 filibusters of nominations. half have occurred during the obama administration. this is what "the washington post" said who looked at it. leader reid's figures confused cloture motions with filibusters, the response to those requests. so just making a request isn't a filibuster. it's actually making a filibuster response to the motion. he said this was despite the clear admonition of the june congressional research service report that cloture motions don't correspond with filibusters. apparently senator reid hasn't had a chance to read it, wanted to ignore it, didn't fit the scenario, the story he was trying to weave. they went on to say since the majority leader files nearly all cloture motions senator reid himself, it says, created the

very statistic that he relied upon to force a rule change. senator reid himself by filing all thesing cloture motions, he is the one who created the very statistic that he relied upon to force a rules change. many of these "the washington post" reports were clearly unnecessary. in fact, they say 32% of all cloture motions in the past four and a half years were withdrawn, withdrawn before a vote. even the fact checker of "the washington post" rejected the majority leader's claim. we especially find it hard to get past c.r.s.'s admonition, the congressional research service admonition that the data in this report should not be used to calculate the number of filibusters as reid's office has done. and they've given him a couple of pinocchios on that one, too. it's nas fascinating to see the majority leader of the united states senate receiving

pinocchio after pinocchio in "the washington post" for continuing to distort or tell his version of a story which just isn't true at all. but i believe all of this is an effort to distract people from all of the issues that are damming -- damning and hurting the president with his standing in the eyes of the american people. it's interesting. you descroapt to go too far back in the newspapers, you just go to wednesday, december 11, yesterday, "wall street journal," page 4. poll: health law hurts president politically. health law hurts president politically. the american people know this is a law that the president forced through party-line vote, middle of the night christmas eve, and it looks like we may be here again christmas eve again year, because of an unwillingness of

the democrats to work together to accept republican ideas, to talk with their colleagues. let's see, the subheadline here -- "disapproval rate. obama's job performance rises to an all-time high." "president's disapproval of his job performance rises to an all-time high of 54%." and then it says, "even as americans are upbeat on the economy." so the president is at an all-time high of his disapproval even at a time when the people feel from an economic standpoint that things aren't -- aren't as bad as they may bemen be. well, why is it? it's because of the health care law. people all across the country -- the numbers are 5 million now have lost their insurance, gotten letters from their -- from their insurance companies saying, sorry, you've lost your insurance. it might have worked well for you. you -- you know? and i've talked to folks at home in wyoming, a -- a ranch family, they have insurance. it works for them. it's what they wanted.

it's what they've had for many years. but they found out it didn't qualify because it wasn't good enough. it's interesting to listen to the president say better insurance. not better for them. more expensive for them, more things to cover that they don't ever need. and the reason they lost their insurance, because it didn't fit the president's 10-point criteria, it didn't include maternity coverage. the woman who knows i'm a doctor, knows i practiced medicine in wyoming for 24 yea years, and i talked to her at the wyoming farm bureau meeting iin laramie a couple years ago, she said, i've had a his rectory. she said, doctor, you know that somebody who's had a hysterectomy doesn't need maternity coverage, they're not going to have more babies. so she lost insurance that the family has had, it worked for the family, that they could afford, that they included in their budget and they lost it because she doesn't have maternity coverage because she's had a hi hysterectomy. she had insurance that worked for her.

who does the president think he is who say that he knows better than she does what's right for her and for her family? that's why the president is being hurt politically, it's the health law. it's the mandates on the american people. it's the president and the democrats in this body saying we know better than you do. we know what your kids need, we know what your family needs, we know what works in your life. well, i'll at the you, mr. president, the president doesn't know. he has no idea what works for these people at home in wyoming and what they have made in intelligent choices, thoughtful choices. he doesn't know what works for them. he doesn't know their lives and needs. and his disapproval rate, not surprising to me, is at an all-time high and it's well deserved. because people are not just being faced with the web site failures, which drew attention to this, that i believe made the secretary of health and human services the laughingstock of america because of her comments and how they played forth on

the -- on the comedy shows, but also and more importantly because of what is below the tip of the iceberg, the higher premiums. and my friend in wyoming has found that what she needs to do in terms of insurance that the president says she needs is going to cause their premiums to skyrocket. now, it's -- it's -- she's going to be forced to buy insurance because the law says all -- all americans need to buy insurance. she's going to be forced to buy insurance that really they don't need, they don't want, they're never going to use and they can't afford. and it's money that's not going to be used for other things. for books for the kids, for food for the table, for things around the house. they're going to lose that opportunity. that's what the -- that's what this is all about. that's why the president's numbers have dropped so significantly. it's -- it's interesting when you go through these statistics, findings from the latest -- and this is a combined poll by the "wall street journal" and nbc news.

the health care law, whether it was a good idea or a bad idea. according to this -- this poll, bad idea, 50%; good idea, 34%. 50%, bad; 34%, good. then they say, what's the impact of this health care law on your family? that's what people wonder about. what does it mean to them? what does this mean to them personally? because it was interesting on the exit polling from the election, the presidential election last year, with mitt romney and barack obama, on the exit polling, people across the country felt at that time that, in response to the question of "cares for someone like me" -- cares for someone like me -- that barack obama did much better, scored much higher than mitt romney. well, now the president is underwater because people are saying, this president doesn't care about me. doesn't know about me, doesn't care about me, not thinking about me. thinking about his legacy but

not thinking about what i'm going to have to pay in premiums, not thinking about the fact that my insurance got canceled, not thinking about me being able to keep my doctor, not caring about fraud and identity theft or the higher co-pays and deductibles. so right now in terms of the poll that was in yesterday's "wall street journal" by nbc news -- it was also on nbc new news -- whether this is going to have a positive impact or a negative impact on people's lives. fewer than 1 in 8 americans believe that this health care law is going to have a positive impact on -- on them and their families. fewer than 1 in 8. fewer than 1 in 8. i mean, it's astonishing that only -- that fewer than 1 in 8 people think that this health care law is going to have a positive impact for them and their family, yet it was crammed down the throat of all americans, forcing them to face all of these issues and costs related to that. the poll shows the president's disapproval at the highest rate ever, 54%, going back from the

time he was elected. and in terms of how you look at this, i mean, let's start reading the article. the federal health care law is becoming a heavier political burden for president barack obama and his party. despite increased confidence in the economy and the public's own generally upbeat sense of well-being, a "wall street journal"/nbc news poll suggests. disapproval of mr. obama's job performance, it said, hit an all-time high in the poll at 54% amid the flawed roll-out of the health care law. half of those polled now consider the poll -- the -- the law as a bad idea, also a record high. well, there was the flawed roll-out but web sites can be fixed and this web site's going to be fixed. that's why the web site failure's only the tip of the iceberg.

the thing that really has people mad are the letters that they've gotten, 5 million letters. and, you know, we don't even know how many letters went out in states like illinois, ohio, texas. we don't have those numbers yet. so the number of folks who've lost their -- their health care coverage, that worked for them, that they liked, that number's going to i believe be higher than 5 million. so this is going to continue to roll out with people showing huge disappointment. i expect the president's popularity to fall even further. i think it's going to get even worse, mr. president, come january 1st, as people start to go to a doctor and find out that maybe they think they bought insurance through the -- through the health care web site and find out that they actually don't have it. we have people that i've talked to and they've put in all the information, they spent hours, they got the -- the web site went down, they came back, they went at low hours and they don't have confirmation yet. they don't know. they really don't know if they have insurance yet.

they'd like to know. they'd like to have assurance and confidence that their government can get something right. the president was on television with bill clinton at that clinton world summit in new york just three or four days before the web site was unveiled. and there was the president sitting with former president clinton saying that this was going to be easier to use than amazon. easier than amazon. cheaper than your cell phone bill. and if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. did the president really believe that or was he so detached, so disconnected from the reality of what's happening in this country that he wasn't even overseeing his job of -- of -- this is his signature achievement and yet he ignored, it seems like, the implementation process. you know, for those in this body who served as governors, as chief executives of states, as -- as our president of the

senate now presiding has done, you never let that happen. you might have tested it out yourself, what's it going to look like? i'm curious. what happens when people sign on? what do we find out? how does it work? but to just push "go" and have this blind confidence that everything is going to be fine and not know and three or four days before be on a world stage saying, oh, easier than amazon. it's -- i think it's very distressing to many people, which is why the president's performance shows such high disapproval, 54%, and why, according to the "wall street journal" poll and nbc news, the health law is hurting the president politically. now, this is not just a survey of a couple people. this survey is of a thousand adults. and it was conducted between december 4 and december 8. and what it did is found a sharp erosion, they say, a sharp erosion since january in many of the attributes of a president.

what are the attributes that you'd like to have in a president? what would a nation look to in a president, attributes that say, this is what we want in our president. honesty. you know, that's a -- what you'd like to have, a president who's honest. leadership ability to handle a crisis. well, you know, that had kept -- they say that had kept president obama aloft through the economic and political turmoil of his first term. but not it's not there anymore. the feelings of the president regarding even his own honesty has dropped precipitously. you don't want our country to have a president that the people think is not honest but that's where we are right now. and i will tell you, mr. president, he brought it upon himself and he did it intentionally, he did it deliberately and he did it by looking into that camera and internally misleading the american people about his health care law. and not just in the lead up to

passing the law but continued all the way through. what did the president say? he said, if you like your insurance, you can keep your insurance, period. period. it was his punctuation of that sentence that said there is nothing after that. he said, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, period. and he's continued to say that. it was interesting, even -- even after the whole debacle, the letters going out, so many people finding their coverage had been canceled, the white house web site -- the white house web site -- continued with a video of the president saying if you like your coverage, you can keep your coverage, period. if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, period.

is it any surprise that the american people no longer find the president trustworthy? honest? is it a surprise, then, that the president finds that the health law is hurting him politically? is it a surprise that his disapproval of his performance is now at an all-time high? that's what we're -- that's what we're dealing with in this country. and yet the president continues to go forth and say, well, what are the republican ideas? we have had idea after idea, tried to visit with the president about those ideas. he wants to hear nothing. he wants to hear nothing. he wants his talking points and he doesn't really have a clear understanding of what damage he has done to america with this law that has hurt so many families across the country and continues to cause pain and suffering and anxiety and as a result anger and as a result,

"health law hurts president politically." so those are the issue as that are -- that are in front of us. i have a letter from a gentleman in cody, wyoming, that i want to -- i want to read and share with you, mr. president. it's -- this came in a couple of days ago. "dear mr. barrasso" -- the people of wyoming know me as dr. barrasso. i still attend the fairs, go to a lot of small communities, visit with people, they come in and we actually did a poll there about why people go to the health fairs. the number-two reason they go is for their and the number-one reason is to see people. i'm sure, mr. president, you've seen similar things in your home staivment but this istate.

but this is a gentleman who knows my activities in the health field. "just got a quote from my insurance agent on obamacare insurance. from $860 i currently spend for my family of four, he said to $2,400 month. from $860 to $2,400 a month. then he says, all with the low deductible of $10,000 per person per year." that's the other issue, this higher co-pay and deductibles. this is a big part of what's happening with this health care law. i mean, it's -- it's interesti interesting. "the wall street journal" -- monday's "wall street journal," december 9, "deductibles fuel new worries of health law

sticker shock." that's what my friend from cody, i would wishings is finding, hitting with -- from cody, wyoming, is finding, hitting with these higher deductibles. i'll share with you some of the things "the wall street journal" said and then get back to this letter from my friend from cody. this is -- "the average individual deductible from what is called a bronze plan on the exchange, a bronze plan, which is the lowest-priced coverage -- average deductible, $5,081 per person a year. $5,081. according to a new insurance report in 34 of the 36 states that rely on the federally runyon line marketplace. -- federally run online marketplace. this is 32% higher than the average deductible for an individual purchased plan in

2013, which is before much of the federal law took place. so deductible -- then you carry over. deductibles fuel new worries of health law. sticker shock. right under the article, "health site in a fuse plague maryland." and i understand that's a state that has their own exchaifnlg that's not even a federally run exchange. so when the president says, the states are doing such a great job. if we just let the states do all of these things, we wouldn't have these problems. maryland is having huge problems, as are quite a few of the states. getting back to in letter, this gentleman from cody, i would wishing-- cody,wyoming, hit wity higher deductible, higher than the average, the average is $5,000, which is higher than last year for people around the country. he said, "i'm not sure what

planet they think i live on. but there's no way i can spend more thank half of my monthly income ons insurance. for the first time in my adult life, i will soon be without insurance." wha well, what does president obama have to say about that? how does the obamacare health care law -- i thought it was writ in a way that people would actually get insurance, into the lose insurance? wasn't that the purpose of all of this? he says this is the first time he will be outinsurance. why? because of the law. "what does it matter if my two 18-year-old children can stay on my insurance plan if i can't afford to keep one?" i mean, that's the big talking point on the other side of the aisle, young people up to age, what, 26 can stay on their parents' health care plan. i think it is a good idea to allow young people to stay on their family's insurance plan. of course the president then tends to add in, and it's free. and i.t. no it's free. there is a dos cost to that.

you but as this gentleman say, what does it matter if they can stay on the insurance plan if i can't afford to keep one? he said, "also all the airtime to preexisting conditions are meaningless if i can't afford to keep a plan. ". meaningless. "i feel greatly blessed to have a good-paying job that i have." "it puts me above the pay level that would allow me to get any subsidies." he has family of four, can't get subsidies. "with the system in place this year, i wouldn't have needed subsidies." so with the current system, he wouldn't have needed subsidies. when you go from $860 to $2,400 a month, you can't afford it, even though he doesn't qualify for subsidies. yet we see the general united states here of the obama health care law ignoring what happens in real people's lives. i think it is troughing see that the people who wrote -- i think it is interesting to see that the people who wrote this law

behind closed doors -- and i know that the president of the senate was not a member of the body at the time. but it was written through closed doors right through that door of the senate, and the people who knew the most about what that -- what's in that law, they seem to me to be the very people that have now been excluded by the majority leader from having to live under it. those are the people that got the exemption and they're the ones that know what's in it. i mean, it is so ironic that the majority leader of the united states senate would say that his people that helped write this law don't have to live under it, and when "the washington post" calls him on it, and yet the rest of america has to live under what isn't good enough for the majority leader's own staff. well, i'll tell you, it's ironic, and it's sad to see the day like this come to our country.

so, as this gentleman says, he's never needed to have subsidies before. he said, "i've never needed them in the past and would like to continue to never get a handout from my government." which is -- this is an independent individual, doesn't want a subsidy, is not asking for a subsidy. he just wants the insurance that worked for him and his family for all of these years. now he has no insurance. now, he said, i employ about 35 people with my company. "when we first opened about a year and a half ago, we were talking about getting some sort of coverage. it became very clear that we will not be able to do this." 35 employees, so under the 50, but still wanted to do the right thing, wanted to give people coverage. he said, not going to be able do this. "and we have stopped any plans to provide this in the future." "we also know for sure that we cannot afford to ever employ

more than 50 people, as we continue to grow. there is an upward limit on how many people we will hire." because of the law. not because the business isn't there. not because the economy won't support it. not because they don't want to employ more people. not because they don't want to help their community. no, because of the health care law. they're putting a cap on what -- on the size of the company. he says, simple economics. "obamacare is a job killer in wyoming. it's never been easy to be inese business. the this is part of the fun of being successful, being in business, the excitement. it is discouraging when our federal government limits the american dream for everyone." the federal government limiting the american dream forren. he says, "i'm thankful for your efforts but from my office chair in cody," he said, "it's already

too late." and i know, mr. president, i'm not the only person in this body that's getting letters like this. i know people who actually voted for the health care law are getting letters like this. i'm not sure what kind of responses they're giving them. we've called these peesm i visit them. the staff has called them. get home on the weekends to listen to folks. when you take a look at that sort of wil letter and that sorf well-thought-out, rational approach to somebody who is working, has been -- has had insurance their only life, provides for their family, and builds a business in a community, hires people, wants to provide insurance and now says, not going to provide insurance, going to limit our growth, and my family loses insurance, and why? it's because of a health care law that i think the president -- i don't know if he had any idea what the impact of this was going to be. we came to the floor of this idea of the aisle day after day, week after week talking about

why when you read the law it's a real problem, why the concerns expressed by the american people should have been listened to but, regrettably, were not listened to, and why i think it is a terrible mistake and very harmful to the american people. and it's not just the web site much it is the higher premiums that my friend from cody is hearing because his coverage was canceled because it wasn't good enough, according to the president; whether he can keep his doctor or not -- we'll get to that in second. but higher co-pays and higher deductibles. those are the things that we're facing now in this country, and people are noticing them all around my state, all around the 50 states. doctors are noticing -- i was in my medical office last week talking to some of my

colleagues, my former medical partners. they are being swamped right now with folks coming in for care, and this is not just in the middle of wyoming. this is all across the country. i talked to a surgeon yesterday on the faculty of duke university. same story there. so you're seeing it east and west, north and south. doctors offic'doctors' offices g swamped with patients. these are people that have insurance now and are afraid they're the no going to have it after the first of the year. they are not sure they are going to have t they haven't gone on the exchanges and haven't gotten confirmation yet. they're also angry. they don't know if they're going to be able to keep their doctor, which gets to the point of "can't keep your doctor." they're go going to their doctors' offices now and say,

i've been put off, put off for a while. my shoulder that's been bothering me or my hip or my knee, and i think i want to get it taken care of now, taken care of now, while i know that you're still my doctor, i know that i can still come to you at least until the end of the year, and i know for sure i still have insurance right now. so hospitals, medical offices, clinics are all be swamped baishts trying to kind of get -- by patients trying to kind of get caught up with things that have been put after for a while, but a they don't know what will happen come january 1 and, i will tell you, neither does the president of the united states. i think think the president doesn't know what's going to happen on january 1. i think he is standing there with his fingers crossed hoping it doesn't get any worse, but i will at the yotell you, i thinko get worse. with higher costs, sticker shock, higher premiums, people are going to find out all across

the country they can't keep their doctor, fraud and identity theft is going to get worse, as more cases get reported, and we're going to see mured and more people not -- more and more people not being able to pay their deductibles. i wan did want to spend a seconn this issue of the president's program that if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. as a doctor, it is a very special relationship between a doctor and a patient and a patient and a doctor. it goes both ways. and it was -- i think it was very telling as well as distressing to me people this past sunday when on one of the sunday news shows ezekiel emanuel, one of the three emanuel brothers, the one that is the professor at the university of pennsylvania, who is a physician in the academic setting, one of the interviewers asked him, it was a true statement, if you like your

doctor, you can keep your doctor? and he said, well, the president never said you could go to all of these other people and specialists. wait a second, let's get back to if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. he bake lip said, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor if you're willing to pay more. that's thought what the president said. the president used the punctuation point, used that period at the end of his sentence. if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, period. now we have ezekiel a manual saying, well, the president didn't really say it. folks have asked me in this body just about the bond between a doctor and a patient, and i think that the president knew very well about that bond when he made the promise, if you like what you have, you can keep it. so i have put pen to paper and had an editorial in yesterday's investors' business daily,

wednesday, december 11, 2013, called "a special bond deeply severed by obamacare." and i'd like to share some of those thoughts with you today, mr. president, because i think there is a special bond. as a doctor, i know what that is like with my patients. i write, a central architect of the president's health care law admitted this week that the often repeated promise that if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor simply isn't true. instead, doctor ezekiel emanuel explained that if you like your doctor, you will simply need to pay more. simply need to pay more to keep your doctor. i write as a physician i know firsthand how this will help -- this will hurt many americans. families look to doctors as trusted friends, confidantes and counselors and turn to them for advice in making life-and-death decisions.

in wyoming patients have included me in graduation, in weddings, and asked me to serve as a pallbearer. they've asked me to pray with them, to referee family disputes and provide reassurance when a doctor they did not know was called in to consult. i go on that norman rockwell's painting doctor and doll tells the story. people can visualize that picture. a little girl holds up her doll as the trusted family doctor listens to the doll with his stethoscope. the physician takes the time to reassure the concerned little girl. the doctor-patient relationship is a very special bond. it requires faith and trust for a patient to allow me to cut into their body to remove a tumor, to replace a wornout joint, to fix a broken bone, to repair a torn ligament and

above all else, to do no harm. the president knew of the special relationship between people and their doctors. that's why when he was trying to gain support for his health care law, he made a clear and simple promise to the american people. the president said if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, period. now people across the country are finding they can't keep their doctors. the same law that has caused millions of americans to lose the health insurance that worked for them, that worked for them, is now causing people to lose their doctor. people shopping for insurance on the exchanges, people going to the web site, people shopping for insurance on the exchanges are being forced to purchase insurance for things they don't want, don't need, or will never use.

to keep costs down, many of these policies limit the doctors and limit the hospitals that patients can use. so not just the doctors, the hospitals as well. including the mayo clinic and cedar sinai medical center. they are excluded from many insurance networks. some of the best children's hospitals in the country are excluded from the exchanges. this means a child with cancer -- there have been articles to this mr. president -- a child with cancer may lose access to his or her doctor and the specialty hospital because of this law. come january 1, there are kids in this country who are not going to have the ability to go under the new plans to the hospitals that have been treating these young people. in new hampshire -- two senators here from new hampshire, one on either side

of the aisle -- in new hampshire, 10 of the state's 26 hospitals -- there are 26 hospitals, 10 of the state's 26 hospitals are excluded from the only carrier offering insurance in the exchange. there's only one carrier in the exchange, i remember the president talking about all this competition -- one carrier in the exchange, 26 hospitals in the state, 10 of them are excluded from that only carrier offering insurance in the exchange. now, i'll tell you as a doctor this next sentence is fascinating. the head of the medical staff of one of the excluded hospitals -- this is the chief of staff of the hospital -- learned that her plan does not even allow her to seek treatment at the -- at her own hospital where she is the chief of staff. it is unbelievable.

you take a look at that and say how could this have happened? but that's the law that was passed and that's the seven-foot tower of regulations that have come out from the bureaucracy. now, i think the situation and i write the situation could be equally bad for seniors on medicare. and for seniors on medicare, you can't keep your doctor. it is a really big deal, it's sometimes difficult for a senior on medicare to find a doctor, if they dent get one and like that doctor they want to keep that doctor. we've seen seniors sometimes move to other communities to be closer to their kids and grandkids to just find a doctor is a vulg, it's a challenge. but i think the situation could be equally bad for seniors on medicare. i write about it in this editorial in the investors business daily yesterday. thousands of doctors caring for

seniors on medicare advantage -- about one in four people in this country are on medicare advantage -- one in four seniors are on medicare scrang. seniors on medicare advantage, thousands of doctors have been dropped from their networks, dropped from their networks so they those medicare patients will now be challenged with finding a new doctor to take care of them. the president's health care law is making it harder for doctors as well. not just -- it's not just the patients, doctors, it's very hard for them because doctors know their patients, know their health history, they know their families, they know their lives. doctors value the personal relationship as much as the patient does. that's why people become doctors in the first place, to take care of their patients. you know, my graduating class and the way we felt about it and i was invited back to speak at

the commencement, i think it was about the 30th year after i had graduated i got invited back as a guest speaker talking to those medical students. that's the same reason people continue to go into medicine. they want to take care of patients. they're intellectually stimulated and challenged by the new advances but you go into medicine so you can take care of your patients. what i also go on in this editorial i say even if someone is able to keep their doctor, they won't necessarily be able to spend as much time with that doctor as they might like. that's because nearly two-thirds of the doctors expect to spend more time on paperwork under the requirements of the new law. so doctors are going to have to spend more time on paperwork, and some of this is done with computers, with electronic medical records but it's still going -- paperworkkeeping

activities and it's interesting because so often the doctors that have the computer in the office with the patient and patients feel that the computer that's mandated under the health care law, that the computer is interfering with the doctor looking at the computer screen rather than looking at the patient. so this is all having a significant impact. so i conclude saying this is not at all what the president promised. people all across america put their faith and trust in barack obama when they elected him president. it is the same kind of faith and trust that people have in their doctor. when patients lose trust in their doctor, or citizens lose trust in their patient, it is extremely difficult to regain. which is why going back to yesterday's "wall street journal," health law hurts president politically, disapproval rate, obama's job performance, the disapproval rate rises to an all-time high

of 54%. disapproving of the president. mr. president, i go on and say in this article which is what happens, i continue to hear from my patients in wyoming, they've always had my home phone number, they are anxious, they are angry, call me at home, they know what they wanted from health care reform. what they wanted was access to quality affordable care. and that's what the president talked about in his speeches but that's not what he delivered in his health care law. that's not what they got with this law. now many face losing the doctor who has always been there for them. i say if president obama wants to regain the trust of the american people he'll sit down with republicans to deliver reforms that will actually help all americans and fully protect the doctor-patient relationship. after all -- and i hear this at home in wyoming -- president obama has his own doctor at the

white house who's dedicated to his care and i'm sure he values that relationship just as much as other americans value their relationship with their doctor. so that, mr. president, is what -- you know, what i felt when i wrote this article called a special bond deeply severed by obamacare in yesterday, december 11 issue of "investor business daily" that people cant keep their doctor, great concerns about that and they're being impacted in so many ways. i had the -- you don't really -- it's interesting, since this health care law passed, i've come 0 the floor just about every week with a doctor's second opinion about the health care law to talk about ways i felt this health care law was bad for patients or bad for doctors, and nurses,

physician assistants, others who take care of those patients. and why i felt it was terrible for taxpayers. but it just seems that in recent weeks, you can pick up any newspaper and there's a story basically saying this law is bad for people. this is "the new york times." and they support the law. monday, this past monday. i don't have to go to last week, this week's papers. robert perr writes frequently on the topic of the health care law, on health exchanges, he says premiums may be low but other costs can be high. for months the obama administration he said has heralded the low premiums of medical insurance policies on sale in the insurance exchanges created by the health law but as consumers dig into the details as consumers dig into the details, which is something

that i was asking on this senate floor a number of years ago when the law passed, will the democrats please dig into the details to see what impact this is going to have on people in terms of higher premiums, in terms of canceled coverage, in terms of trying to keep their doctor and in terms of higher co-pays and deductibles, in terms of people on medicare trying to find a doctor to take care of them. as consumers dig into the details, he said, they are finding that the deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs are often much higher -- often much higher, not rare case, often much higher than what is typical often much higher than what is typical in employer 0-sponsored -- employer-sponsored health plans. this says the exchanges are not going to be helping many, many people. i found it interesting to talk a

little about people not being able to keep their doctors, but also not being able to keep their hospitals. and say why is that? i think we're seeing a number of these exchanges and policies being offered, they realize that people that go to certain hospitals have more serious conditions, likely more expensive and as a result don't include those hospitals. even in some of the paper called the financial times this week, again monday, health care insurers cut costs by excluding top hospitals. people -- this is monday of this week. we're seeing this week after week which is why i've been coming to the floor with great regularity just to share with this body what people are across the country are seeing. people buying insurance plans it says under obamacare will have limited access, limited access

to some of the leading u.s. hospitals. including two renowned cancer centers as insurers try to cut costs. there's a picture there of m.d. anderson cancer center at the university of texas, it says plan will not cover treatment at houston cancer center. i didn't even get into that in my article. i talked about peed trat@trick hospitals --, pediatric hospitals, about the new hampshire hospitals, you're talking about major cancer hospitals that are not included in the exchanges for the most part, and that's why what we're seeing all across the country. compare it to what kind of car you can buy and what kind of coverage you get but the bottom line is, people were misled by the president and people feel deceived by this president.

tuesday's "washington post," under health law insurers limiting drug coverage. costs may soar for those with h.i.v. and other ailments. this isn't a back page. this is the front page of "the washington post," all a result of what the democrats on a party-line vote passed and forced upon the country. that's what's going on here, mr. president. we have a health care law that people are very uncomfortable and they're going to continue to let the president know that which is why he's being hurt, his a a -- disapproval is the highest ever, and what has been sharply eroded are folks' belief in this president's honesty and his leadership ability to handle a crisis. this is a

crisis for the president. this is a crisis for the country. and what's the president doing about it? well, he's blaming the republicans for a law that passed with no republican votes. he's blaming the republicans for an idea that was his and was forced through on party-line votes without republican input, written behind closed doors, right through those doors over there by people who have now been excluded, don't have to go under the health care law and yet "the washington post" "harry reid's explanation for why not all his staff is going on obamacare" and the big three pinocchios -- remember the story of pinocchio, the boy whose nose grew whenever he told falsehoods. that's what "the washington post" has to say about the majority leader of the united states senate in not making his

employees -- all of his employees live under what -- what the rest of the country is having to deal with right now. i think it's very distressing, mr. president. and that's what we're facing. the country is facing higher premiums. you know, are people going to not have christmas because they're instead having to use that money to pay their january premium? are they going to not pay the january premium? i mean, how does that play into all this. do they decide, well, i don't think i'm going to -- going to have insurance like my friend from cody that wrote to me who's had insurance all of his life but not now? and, you know, a senator from wyoming, the other senator, the senior senator, mike enzi. he was one who was also sounding the alarm during this entire debate. you know, he -- he saw the impacts beforehand. and it was interesting, there was a letter to the editor in the "powell tribune," a newspaper in wyoming, that

talked about what we saw coming with this health care law. it was written by someone from gillette, a marion scott. and the headline is, "enzi saw a.c.a. impacts beforehand." it says, "dear editor, fox news," they say, "had a very interesting and informative program tuesday, november 6, on the kelly files with megan kelly. as anyone who watches fox news knows, they are covering the beginning effects of the affordable care act, also known as obamacare, and it is being implemented. megan kelly began her program stating she had a special guest who had predicted three and a half years ago almost exactly what will happen when the obamacare law goes into effect this october. her special guest was our own wyoming senior senator, mike enzi, and he had made his predictions in a speech on the senate floor three and a half years ago.

he was then called a fearmongerrer and radical right-winger." and he was. that's what they called him when senator enzi went to the floor because of his concerns that you wouldn't be able to keep your insurance. he had actually read the federal register, saw the regulations that came out and he said, millions of people are going to lose their insurance. he said it from right here at this desk over here, came to the senate floor, said it three and a half years ago, and those on the other side of the aisle voted against senator enzi's proposal to actually let people keep their insurance. it was the regulations regarding grandfathered insurance policies, that people would be able to keep their policy. that was the vote. those on this side of the aisle all voted to allow people to keep their policies because that's what the president promised them. and folks on the other side of the aisle voted against senator enzi's proposal. so they -- but those on the other side called senator enzi a

fearmonger and radical right-winger. senator enzi was probably, they say, one of a very few elected officials who had actually read the bill. senator enzi, it says, was one of the few elected officials who actually read the bill. and i believe that, mr. president. i mean, who can forget nancy pelosi saying, first you have to pass it before you get to find out what's in it? i mean, that video has been played and played again and again. and -- and i believe that many of the people who voted for it never did read it. i believe they didn't read the bill. i believe they don't really -- didn't really understand it. and part of it is i believe they actually believed the president when he said, if you like what you have, you can keep it. if you like your insurance, you can keep it. if you like your doctor, you can keep it -- keep your doctor. so they took this as an article of faith. i read the bill. senator enzi read the bill. i know a number of our members

who read it were very concerned and came to the floor and spoke about different parts of the bill. i can remember senator susan collins standing here with her sign about the impact on small businesses. and how detrimental it was going to be. i remember senator olympia snowe down here on the floor focusing on how it was going to impact businesses in maine. and yet all of these concerns that we raised which are now coming home to roost today were ignored on the other side of the aisle. well, this woman continues and concludes by saying, "with this kind of representation in the senate, i would ask wyoming voters this question: is now a good time to send a new u.s. senator to washington and lose this experience and seniority?" i'll tell you, i'm proud to stand with senator enzi and he saw it coming. he saw it coming three and a half years ago with this -- with

this amendment on the senate floor. and we voted that way, and the democrats voted essentially to confirm that people would lose their insurance and not going to be able to keep it even if they like it. so these are the problems that continue to plague the health care law, continue to plague folks all around the country as they're trying to deal with something that they never anticipated. you try and think a year and a advance what's going to happen with our kids, what's going to happen, are we going to need to do something with the car, patch a hole in the roof? what -- how do we kind of budget for the year? i'll tell you, my friend from cody, wyoming, never, ever saw it coming that he was going to have to go from $860 a month to $2,400 a month for health insurance. and we know that at least 5 million people have gotten letters that they've lost their insurance. for them, i don't think they're going to find that it's going to be very -- a happy holiday season, a very merry christmas.

i think they're going to be trying to figure out, do i have insurance or do i go without is what's going to happen with my friend there. those are the things we're looking at. then, of course, the -- the -- the web site. i mean, it's just interesting. this is an article in this week's "jackson hole news and guide," jackson hole, wyoming. "new health care glitches plaguing jacksonites. marketplace insurance companies try to mail paperwork to jackson addresses but they only get mail in post office boxes there." but that's how the web site was set up there wasn't an for a street address or a mailing address when they need a physical address but in some places you don't get mail that way. in many places around the country in certain rural american locations. but people that wrote it, people that did this whole thing rather clueless about how the country works, rather clueless about what happens in people's homes,

in people's families, in people's communities. you know, i'm sure they're very smart people and got degrees from advanced places but really don't have an idea of what -- what's -- what's going on out there. you know, i also found it interesting that even when the president tried to tell success stories of people that may have had some success under this, doesn't even -- doesn't even pan out. i mean, the story on cnn, "woman hailed by president as obamacare success story now can't afford obamacare." "cnn reports that a woman the president hailed as an obamacare success story just realized she won't be able to afford obamacare because it's too expensive." it's too expensive. mr. president, you know, this is the -- this is the tragedy. this is a national tragedy, this obama health care law, and it

was a self-inflicted wound on our country. no foreign enemy did this to us. the president of the united states, who gave speeches that painted a broad picture of a better world, has delivered a much worse world for folks through this legislation. i mean, this -- it's -- it's -- i think this is devastating to the country, to patients, to doctors, to the -- to the nurses, the caregivers, and to the taxpayers. the -- the reason that we needed health care reform in this country was because of the cost of care. that's what this was all about, trying to help people get the care they need from a doctor they choose at lower cost. i mean, that's what we were really focused on. so we needed reform.

we needed the right kind of reform, reform that actually lowers patients' costs, improves health and protects the vulnerable. so that means more affordable insurance options. it means helping people with preexisting conditions. it means protecting the quality care for older americans. we don't have any of that with this president's health care l law. this is causing costs to go up, causing quality to go down, causing people to lose their doctor. and the president time and time again, in speech after speech, talked about providing coverage but not providing care, and as doctor, i will tell you, there is a huge difference between coverage and care. this whole thing was predicated

on printing up and giving out people medicaid cards. medicaid is a broken system. states will tell you, governors will tell you that in many states, medicaid is the number-one cost driver of the state. in our home state, number one, when i was in the state senate, what is meant is that money that went to that then didn't -- wasn't able to be used for teachers or schools or students or roads or public safety officers. it's a huge cost driver. so the issue is, we needed to deal with cost of care and the president said, put them all in this medicaid system. what is it, 40%? a high number of physicians don't want to take pieshts medicaimed -- take pieshts medid because the reimbursement on doctors who take those patients

is low enough that you can't afford to keep the doors of the clinic open if all you saw were medicaid patients all day. so doctors want to see and take care of everyone. the idea was to put all these additional people on medicaid, give them medicaid cards, but this whole health care law did nothing adequately to address the need for more health care providers. so now you have more people with so-called coverage but it's empty coverage, it's not quality care because there aren't enough people to actually take care of the patients who are now being covered. it's like giving people a bus ticket when there's no bus coming and they can just stand there but it doesn't mean they can actually get care. but the president continued to focus on coverage and coverage doesn't equal care. so those -- you know, you take a look at the problems that families face of costs and access and what the president is trying to provide is coverage,

but we're seeing higher premiums, coverage canceled, which is coverage that worked for many people. some of these now being forced into trying to find something. people losing their doctor and higher out-of-pocket costs, higher co-pays, higher deductibles. you read these stories and somebody saying i have to pay all thank -- month. and they say, why should i even sign up? why don't i just pay the fine? why pay all this month and then have such a high deductible that i'm going to never use that much care, and maybe they never will use that much. so the logic behind this whole thing is baffling to many who have kind of ignored it i think until now, until october 1st, when the web site went live and subsequently crashed repeatedly. but now they're saying, hey, i've lost my insurance. that's i think been the real fracture point on this.

when people see that they have lost their insurance that has worked for them and to replace it is going to be something that doesn't work as well for them and their families and is going to be more expensive. so, you know, we see the public reaction to the law, and its reaction related to the premiums, related to trying to use the exchanges, and related to whether, you know, employers stop hiring, which we've seen from my friend from cody, wyoming. we've seen the reaction from reduced work hours. if you work more than 30 hours a week, you get counted towards those 50 employees, so many employers have lowered the work hours. president obama said we'll just

delay the employer mandate for a year. that's the mandate in the law that everyone has to -- at work they have to supply insurance to the employees, and i think the president may have had some idea that things were going to get sticky for him and he was going to become a little more unpopular with the individual mandate, so he pushed off the employer mandate for a year, unilaterally. when is the law the law, and when is the law something that the president can just take a page out, throw it way away and, we'll move that back a year. things happened 13, 14 times in yointhe law. it is astonishing. what about the individual mandate? we're going to be fining people with the government and the president is going to be fining people, whether it is a fine, a tax, a penalty, depending on what -- how the supreme court

states. that's going to go into effect january 1. people might not even be able to buy the product that they're being fined for not having. is the president going to delay the individual mandate as well? there was a vote in the house. a number of people -- there was bipartisan support for that. i think it's going to be challenging in the days ahead for the president to get ahead of the situation that the country is facing. now, the newest numbers were out yesterday with the signup and the associated report -- associated press reported on that, and the health care signups they say pick up the pace in november. playing catch-up with a long way to go. president obama's new health insurance markets last month

picked up the dismal pace of signups, the administration reported wednesday. employment statistics showed about 364,000 people had signed up as of november 30 under the health care law, although that's more than -- that's more than three times the october total. it's less than a third of the 1.2 million people officials had originally projected would enroll nationwide by the end of november. so crunch time is coming. consumers who are afraid they don't have health insurance, they have until december 23 if he want to keep their coverage january 1. that's why we're seeing so many people across the country who do have insurance going to doctors now, the doctor they know, the doctor they like, to take care of problems that may have been,

you know, kind of put on back burner but that they would like to have taken care of now, because they're not sure what's going to happen january 1. not sure if they'll be able to go to the same doctor, the same hospital, not sure if they're going to be able to even have insurance, even though they think they might have insurance. those are the things that the american people are facing. so, as we come do the floor to discuss this nominee, you know, a number of questions i have are those related to what she would think about employers, changing things, people not signing up, others being forced to sign up, should she have to live under the law of the land, as a government employee, when the senate majority leader says, well, some of his people do, some don't.

these are questions that you would expect to have answered, and i know we're going to vet on that nominee in a couple -- we're going to vote on that nominee in a couple of hours. but i think i this is something that the nominee should be thinking about as we take a look at the health care law and the devastating impacts it's having on people all across the country. the -- you take a hook look at what's happening for consumers, people who don't work in washington, people who don't live in washington, and what you see is that the costs are going to be crippling to them. i stand here amazed that, you know, that gentleman from cody, i would wishingcouldwyoming, tr. i don't know that everybody is going to face that. er but the president promised that the costs would go dowfnlt

he promised his health care reform would save american families, i think he said $2,500 per year by the end of his first term. and i've seen the reel of him saying -- 15 times he said that. your insurance premiums will go down by $2,500 by the end of the first term. go down? they've gone up significantly, thousands of dollars they've gone up. when he was a candidate running for president, he promised his health care reform would save families $2,500 by the i understand of his first teem. for many americans, it's driving the premiums way up. in some cases doubling them, in some cases tripling them. and it's happening on the exchanges. it's happening for people who are trying to shop not on the exchanges, but if they've lost their policy and have to start paying for a lot of other things, whenl it is pediatric

denying taidental care, ophthal, all of those things drive up the costs. and that's the sticker shock of the health care law. so as people continue to learn more about the law, they're going to tirntion i think contio become more and more displeased, which is why i think we're going to go back to this headline, "health care law hurts president politically." and i know for people in this body, that's a big tea deal andr the president that's a big deal. the last time i had a chance to speak face to face with the president, he was talking a lot about polls. as a doctor, i'm more concerned about how the health law is hurting people's health. hurting their families, hurting their families economically, hurting the health that they need, the dhai chair that they d

-- the care that they neerksd interfering with life choices, impacting their quality of life, trusting them in terms of disposable income, and it's all because of the health care law. so, mr. president, i am going to continue to come back to the floor on a regular basis to talk not about the web site failures, because that's just the tip of the iceberg. i suspect that the web site is going to get fixed. it is going to take them a lot longer than they ever would have suspected because the day it happened, they described the web site as being a result of heavy traffic. when we know that on that same way worldwide many, many web sites had much more traffic, and the thing broke down at i think, what, less than 1,000 people logging on. but they said it would be fixed almost immediately and it wan w,

and they gave themselves two months, and it wasn't. and somebody testified not too long ago in the house to say the back end hasn't been built. there's 30% to 40% that hasn't even been put together. but ultimately the web site will get fixed. but the higher premiums will continue. people trying to buy insurance for their family that meets the criteria that the president has set out, which isn't really based on the criteria that works for families or necessary for families. it's just the ten things that government h' has decided that y think they know what's best for families, when i think families know what's best for them and what they would look for with health insurance and health care. so you're going to continue to face higher premiums. people are going to continue to have their coverage canceled. and it's not just the individuals. next years when the employer mandate goes into effect, when businesses are forced to make a

decision, do i try to buy health insurance that meets all of these high demands, that government says has to be included, do i meet all of that and face these double or triple higher premiums or do i say, just go to the exchanges? do patients, people who work, will they lose their employer employer-based insurance? i think we're going to see more and more of that. even the congressional budget office, who took a look at this law, said it will havment they - sthaid it will happen. they said there are employers who arwho will no longer provide insurance who are providing it now. there are din assessment differt assessments as to how many people will lose t i've seen different ranges but it starts in the low millions and goes

into the 20 million and 30 million and even higher than that. those are the folks tha that wie losing. will those people be able to keep their doctor. the answer there is, many will not. many will not. many of those who have lost their insurance now aren't going to be able to keep their doctor, even if they want to and even if their doctor wants to keep them. doctors don't even know if they're going to be included in a umin of these exchanges. they can't find out when they go and look and try see if they can get on the web site, where are they covered, where are they not included. this has been so poorly thought out and so poorly executed. it has left pay cut patients ie lurch and hospitals and doctors in the lurch. i am astonished that all of these people have the faith and confidence of the president which is probably another reason

why people don't look to the president as having either honesty or leadership ability to handle a crisis. to see such a precipitous drop in the viewt of the president of the united states's abet to handle a crisis. if they can't get this right, what happens in terms of a national disaster, how could he respond quickly when he had three and a half years to put together a web site that apparently he paid very little attention to? so we're looking at the higher premiums, canceled coverage, can't keep your doctor, the higher co-pays and deductibles are going to continue to plague this country and people, and i know that people on both sides of the aisle are going to get throwers this effect. i know, mr. president, when you go home every night to your home state, you hear from people, you stop and fill up with gas, you hear from pees people. i'm hoping that other colleagues of ours will actually read their

mail, go home, listen to people to see how deaf tatin devastatin impact this health care law is having on their individual lives. will there be some people that benefit from this health care law? oh, yes, but the pain that it's causing for millions and millions of americans is not at all what the president promised them. you like what you have, ceeb you can keep it with your insurance. not triewvment insurance premiums drop $2,500. not triewvment if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. not true. so, mr. president, i come to the floor to discuss a nominee who very likely is not going to ever have to be living under the president's health care law. they're going to go under some other health care program, paid for with taxpayer dollars that those taxpayers are not going to have in their own pockets to pay for their own premiums, while she enjoys a government

insurance program paid for in a different way by their taxpayer dollars, where she's likely to be able to keep her doctor, not be subjected to the higher premiums, not be subjected to canceled coverage, not be subjected to losing her doctor, not be subjected to the fraud and identity theft, and not be subjected to the higher co-pays and deductibles. and i would say, mr. president, if it's good enough for the people of america -- that's what president obama wanted for them -- if it's good enough for members of this body, except for those that the majority leader said, oh, no, they know what's in it, so they don't need to live under it, i think it ought to be good enough for this nominee as well. so, thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call: