Fresno County –
Yesterday, we finally received the full text of the Senate Republicans’ bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act. It was even worse than we thought: the GOP is not trying to fix our health care system, they’re trying to dismantle it. Taking health insurance away from millions of Americans, so they can give tax breaks to the very wealthy. We must stop them.
I can’t do this alone — but if we raise our voices together, we can win this fight. This morning, I wrote an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, which I’ve included below, to urge the American people to come together to fight this bill. A vote is scheduled for next week — with no hearings, so far no debate, and barely enough time to parse out the details or the consequences.
The GOP health care bill will affect all Americans, regardless of party affiliation. This isn’t about partisanship, this is about ensuring that all of us have a right to health care access. Here are a few ways you can take action today:
- First, make a public declaration against this legislation by adding your name to our petition today.Show the GOP that millions of Californians and Americans are standing against this disastrous plan.
- Second, I need you to call the Senate switchboard operator at (202) 224-3121 and tell your Senator that you strongly oppose this bill. We have to flood Congress with calls in the coming days to ensure this legislation is defeated.
- Third, I need you to share your story about how this legislation will affect you or someone you care about. Facts and numbers are important, but we need to elevate your voices and make sure the GOP knows what’s at stake — people’s lives.
I can help you understand Trumpcare, but I can’t defeat it alone
By Senator Kamala Harris
Next week, Republicans want the United States Senate to vote on a bill that would restructure our nation’s entire health care system — a system that makes up one-sixth of the American economy. This bill would affect the lives of nearly every American, from our parents or grandparents in need of caregiving, to our children struggling with asthma or opioid addiction, to our spouses battling cancer.
And we only just received the full text on Thursday, a week before the vote on the bill.
Many will recall Republicans complaining about the Affordable Care Act being rushed through Congress. In fact, the ACA went through 106 public hearings and incorporated more than 170 Republican amendments. The whole process took an entire year.
Republicans are trying to ram their health care proposal through the Senate with little to no transparency. There have been no hearings, no debate, and hardly any time to examine the details of the proposal. We are being asked to vote blindly on a bill that has life-or-death consequences for those we represent.
The American people deserve better. The American people deserve greater transparency.
But while the authors of this proposal have tried to conceal the details of their plan by working in secret until the last minute, it’s clear that this bill would be nothing short of a disaster. It’s just as bad — and in some cases worse — than the bill that narrowly passed the House of Representatives in May. That bill was so catastrophic that even the president of the United States, who once praised its passage, now calls it “mean.”
Here’s what we know: The Senate Republican plan would throw millions of Americans off their insurance, including potentially up to 5 million Californians. It would raise costs for middle-class families and seniors. It would put Americans with preexisting conditions at risk and cut hundreds of billions from Medicaid and Medi-Cal, which pays for everything from substance abuse treatment to support for children with special needs. That’s unacceptable.
This bill is being written along strictly partisan lines, but health care is not a partisan issue. Your health isn’t dictated by your party affiliation. Supporting or opposing this health care plan is not about being a Democrat or a Republican — it is about right and wrong. Instead of wreaking havoc on our health care system, we owe it to the American people to come together and solve real problems.
I’m home this weekend, and like my Democratic colleagues, I’ll be working hard to ensure that people on the ground understand how this bill will affect them. But we can’t do it alone. We need Californians to make themselves heard.
Because we won’t give up trying to protect and strengthen our health care. I recently co-sponsored a bill with Sen. Dianne Feinstein and a number of my Democratic colleagues. Our bill would make it easier for middle-class Americans to buy insurance if they currently don’t qualify for any help paying their premiums. That’s the kind of innovation that Democrats and Republicans should both be able to support. That’s the kind of innovation that would help — not hurt — the people we represent.
One of those people is Rhett, a 9-year-old in Marin County, Calif., who was diagnosed with leukemia when he was only 2½ years old. Rhett endured more than 1,000 chemotherapy doses to, in his words, “get the bad guys out” of his body.
Thankfully, Rhett is now in remission. Because of the ACA, he doesn’t have to worry about being denied insurance coverage one day because of his preexisting condition. His family doesn’t have to worry about how they will pay for his treatment if his cancer returns. Rhett wants to be a doctor when he grows up, and thanks to the ACA, he can stay on his parents’ health insurance when he goes to college and medical school.
We should listen to Rhett when he tells us, “Don’t repeal the Affordable Care Act, improve it!” The ACA isn’t perfect. And I’m ready to work with anyone who really wants to make it work better. So let’s stop playing politics with public health and people’s lives. Let’s reject this hasty and harmful legislation and work together to actually strengthen our health care system.
Thank you for everything you do. I know together we can defeat this bill and save the lives of so many who are at-risk in this fight.
Kamala Harris
U.S. Senator, California
“Freedom is never really won. You earn it and win it in every generation.”
– Coretta Scott King
