參議院民主黨領袖舒默就醫療保健問題舉行記者會

OK, well, I'm here today with Senators Lujan and Welch, and Lisa Blunt Rochester is on her way. She's voting. OK, well, we're here. Why are we here? The country is standing on the edge of a health care cliff, a cliff Republicans are pushing us towards, and the clock is almost out. 27 days, that's all the time Americans have before ACA premiums expire and health care costs explode in every state, city, and locality of the country. The Senate Republicans can avoid this now. The Senate can vote to pass our legislation, plain and simple, and save American thousands. Republicans caused this problem. They knew this cliff was coming and would only make the pain worse for Americans, yet they've chosen to do nothing, absolutely nothing. They are nowhere. They don't even have a proposal, and the American people are running out of time. So today I'm announcing that Senate Democrats will introduce legislation for a three-year clean extension of the current ACA tax credits. This bill, a clean year three extension of the ACA tax credits that Democrats will bring to the floor for a vote on Thursday, and every single Democrat will support it, every single Democrat. That means Republicans have only one week to decide where they stand. Are they going to vote for this bill and bring health care costs down for the American people, or block this bill and send premiums skyrocketing on January 1st? that millions of American families are staying up and can't sleep at night because they don't know what they're going to do. Republicans have no plan to deal with this crisis. No plan. And make no mistake, the vote is the last chance, the last chance before January 1st to avoid the crisis they caused and bring relief to the American people. They have no unity. They have no consensus. They don't even have concepts. You got one Republican saying this, another Republican saying that. It's amazing. They have nothing in the most major issue affecting the American people, and they can't get their act together. Democrats are fighting to lower health care costs. Republicans are fighting with one another. They're so busy fighting one another that they're not helping the American people. For months, they spent their energy trying to kick low-income families off their coverage, pushing poison pills that ban abortion, floating one-time checks that wouldn't even cover a single month of premiums, let alone 12 months. And families, as we know, are paying more. Republicans want to hand them, the few Republicans who have this payment plan, want to hand them a Band-Aid while premiums jump $1,000, $2,000, $5,000 a month. So, a one-time check's not health care. It won't stop January's premium shock. If Republicans block our bill, there's no do-over. Premiums go up January 1st, period, and the premiums are like a hammer blow to the American people. You all know the numbers. Couples nearing retirement making $85,000 a year could pay $30,000 more in states like Maine, Alaska, Montana, and Tennessee. 24 million Americans will see their premiums double. Americans living with chronic illness will suffer. Real communities will be devastated. Even families with employer coverage, they say, well, I'm covered by my employer. Ask your friends who work for companies like that. They're already getting notice of higher bills because it's affecting everybody. So, Senate Democrats are united. We're clear-eyed about the consequences. We are ready to vote. Senator Lujan. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Leader. Well, it's good to see everyone here today, and I want to thank Leader Schumer for bringing us together. Look, this is about affordability. What Republicans are doing right now, they really don't give a damn how expensive health care is going to be for the American people. Plain and simple. Republicans had an opportunity to work with Democrats to get real legislation, real policy included that would extend these tax credits to make health care more affordable for millions of people across the country. They chose not to. And it's no surprise Republicans for the last, I don't know, 10 years or more, have voted over 70 times to get rid of the Affordable Care Act, to repeal it. You all remember their calling call. We're going to repeal and replace. And that wasn't so popular with the American people on polling. So Republicans, oh, sorry, they just said they're going to repeal first, right? And then it was repeal and replace. Well, they never did it. What does that mean to folks? President Trump brought junk plans back, making it OK for the American people to buy some insurance plan, even if they had some chronic disease like cancer. To buy insurance that covers everything but the cancer. One gimmick after another. Making things more expensive to the American people. And as Leader Schumer said, look, this isn't just about people across the country that are going to benefit from these tax credits directly. This is going, if Republicans don't come to the table to extend these tax credits, we all know that insurance is getting more expensive for everyone, including everyone in this room. This is impacting the entire market. Some constituents over Thanksgiving chatted with me that they were excited to read that they were going to get a cost of living adjustment in their Social Security. And then they got sticker shock when the Medicare cost came and it ate up what they saw with the COLA and some. Over Thanksgiving, people were getting an idea of what health insurance was going to cost. More sticker shock. They were back at the desk on Monday trying to figure things out if they're going to be able to afford it. It's one problem after another. And then to boot, in the big, beautiful bill, Republicans cut all of the federal tax dollars with Medicaid. There's rural health clinics across the country that already announced that they're going to be closing. I mean, this is just one kick in the face after another that Republicans are delivering. I'm going to close with this. You all know that I've been chatting about it more and more and more about that stroke that I survived three years ago. I don't know how many of you have been in a hospital bed worrying about getting better. But when you're sick and you might die, all you should be worried about is getting better. Not what happens if you're going to lose your house because you can't afford the damn bill that's going to come after you get better, if you're fortunate to. This is absolutely wrong for Republicans to be lying to the American people and not stepping forward. If they want to come up with reforms, put them on the table. They've had time. Let's get these things extended. The bill that Leader Schumer's talking about has Republican support in the House. They've introduced their own bill. There's a support to get this done and get it to the president. I hope and I pray that my Republican colleagues will do the right thing. There's no reason that they can't join us. Get this done. Do it on a voice vote, for God's sakes. Get this done. Tell the American people before Christmas you're going to be OK. We care about you. We're not going to kick you in the face one more time. With that, I'm going to turn it over to my friend from Vermont, Peter Welch. Thank you very much. You know, we have a health care crisis in this country. This country pays the most and gets the least. Literally, we pay about two times more than European countries or Canada. And our health care outcomes are not as good. Which is not to say we don't have great care. But it is getting unaffordable. We've got a calendar that is relentlessly ticking away. And unless we extend these tax credits so that people can continue to have the same health care in 2026 that they had in 2025, 24 million Americans are in jeopardy. Leader Schumer brought the Democrats together. We felt it was our responsibility to put a concrete plan on the table that would make certain that Americans across the country did not lose their health care. And Chuck, thank you. We have 47 votes. We need 13 more. The key to that is going to be whether President Trump wants to engage and bring the parties together to extend these credits. The aspect of this that I find very sad is that the people who are going to suffer are people who are represented by Democrats and by Republicans. It just doesn't matter. These are folks, families, farmers. They need health care. You know, I got a call from a farmer in the northeast kingdom of Vermont. He's a Trump voter. But he said, Peter, I'm paying 900 bucks a month for health care. And if we lose these tax credits, my health care is going to go up to $3,200. And he said, you don't have to worry about me anymore because my family is dropping health care. Well, I do care about him. We all care about him. And that's why Leader Schumer brought the Democrats together to put on the table a concrete plan. We don't have anything in response. And, you know, we often get in the blame game around here. But the one group that cannot be blamed are the Americans who are going to be losing their health care. They have no power to address this. So the Schumer plan here is a concrete proposal that would give security to folks in Vermont. And I'm going to be going to Nebraska and Iowa in my capacity as the ranking member of the rural subcommittee on Rural America and the Ag Committee. But I'm going to be talking to farmers out there who are going to be saying the same thing as that northeast kingdom farmer said to me. We want to protect the health care that families in this country have. And that includes Republicans. It includes Democrats. It includes independents. So we've got a concrete plan. We've had no response. And that means we're just going to abandon families and businesses and Americans who are going to lose in 2026 what they had in 2025. We've got to pass this bill. Thank you. I'm going to turn it over to Lisa Blunt-Rochester. Thank you. First, thank you, Leader Schumer, for inviting me to participate. It's really good to be here with two senators who I had the honor of serving with on the Energy and Commerce Committee in the House. We did a lot of good work on prescription drugs, health disparities, and a whole host of other issues. And as I stand here, I'm literally thinking and watching the clock in front of me tick. The clock is ticking. Time is running out. There is a sense of urgency for those of us who are standing up here. And so I know the leader would say he doesn't consider this his plan. He considers this the American plan, that we do something. And I will tell you, as was said by my colleagues, I come from the state of Delaware. And anyone who knows Delaware knows that we are urban, suburban, rural, and coastal. We have farmers. We have small businesses. We have environmental justice communities that are impacted, even by CAFE standards. And so I will tell you, yesterday, when I was looking at my television and seeing our Republican colleagues at the White House, what I thought they were announcing was a health care plan. I was shocked that what they were announcing was something that would make us less healthy. And so as I stand here today, I think about the years of my work in this space of health. I served as Deputy Secretary of Health and Social Services in Delaware and got to see the impact of health care. I served as head of state personnel, so I saw health care from an employer perspective and how much it costs and how do you keep people healthy. I served as CEO of the Urban League, so I got to see health disparities and how in this country, as rich as we are, we have one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. So health care to me is a basic necessity. It's what drove me to run in 2016 and what I fought for. And times, it's sort of like history is repeating itself or rhyming. Because I came in, Donald Trump was president. Republicans had the House and the Senate. And as was said, there were calls for repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act. What we recognize is that the Affordable Care Act is not perfect. But one thing I do know is that that family who has somebody with a pre-existing condition like asthma or diabetes is grateful. That parent who has a kid who's 22 or 23 is grateful. And so what we're saying here is very simple. We have an immediate problem. An immediate crisis. An immediate cliff. And we need to take immediate action. And that's why we're proposing the three-year time frame to allow us to also work with our Republican colleagues to make the substantial changes that we need to make to make us a healthier country and to make sure that we have a health care system that's working for all of us. I came up here with a whole bunch of notes and really didn't use any of them because it's really that basic. It's really that simple. We're proposing something that will help right now while we also give time to work together. I have stories of Delawareans as my colleagues do. Small business owners, rideshare drivers, young people who are concerned. For the first time, I had a resource fair. For the first time, people were lined up hugging me saying, Please help us. Please. And so we stand up here on behalf of the hardworking families. And we also stand up here to say for anyone, including the President, to say that this is a Democratic hoax. Right now, people are looking in their e-mail and in their mailboxes, and they have the receipts. It's happening now. And we need to act now. And so I thank you, Leader Schumer, for your leadership. I'm fortunate that I had the opportunity to also work with Senator Wyden on legislation, the Protecting Patients and Affordable Care Act that focuses on not just the three years, but it is in tandem with this to make sure that some of the harmful things that were already done this year through the big, beautiful bill and through regulation are actually pulled back so that people, again, don't fall off a cliff and that we're making sure that they're able to navigate this system. Again, I'm glad to be standing here before you, but I'll be happier when we pass this legislation. Thank you, and I yield back. Questions on this subject. Yes. ... Shows you how out of touch they are. 55% of people who voted for Trump in November of 2024 support extending the credits. 55% of Trump voters. The Republicans are so much in a bubble. They're so out of touch, they don't understand the anguish and concern of the American people. Yes. ... 包括川普的投票者 - 如果我們要做一些事 - 看 - 如果我們要做一些事 - 最底線是 - 避免這個災難 - 13個民主黨人 - 要和我們一起投票 - 至於任何 - 任何議案 - 我們會一直在看 - 但我甚至看不到 - 15個民主黨人 - 現在支持 - 民主黨人沒有計劃 - 沒有一致性 - 他們在互相對抗 - 當然一個人 - 或兩三個人 - 可以說這個或那個 - 不會解決問題 - 是的 - 川普稱之為騙局 - 川普應該 - 和民主黨議員們談談 - 說 - 投票 - 為這個議案 - 這就是解決問題的方式 - 這就是解決問題的唯一的方式 - 在1月1日的期限前 - 我的意思是 - 看看 - 他們甚至沒有計劃 - 他們甚至沒有兩個計劃 - 他們是分裂的 - 他們在各個方面 - 在各個方面 - 互相對抗 - 這太瘋狂了 - 在一個如此重要的議題上 - 他們會有這個 - 是的 - 他們沒有 - 好的 - 問他們想做什麼對抗 - 那些五或六個民主黨人 - 是的 - 您可以跟民主黨人討論 - 但是在我討論的民主黨人的角度 - 民主黨人從未有一個計劃 - 甚至接近接受 - 他們不願意對抗 - 我的意思是彼得是那些人 - 請說 - 最底線是 - 他們不可以 - 他們不可以放一張紙 - 他們不可以提出一些具體的東西 - 他們可以說我們有四個票 - 或五個票或六個票 - 所以是 - 這是一個希望的討論 - 但是從來沒有具體 - 所以真正的現實是 - 是說從來沒有 - 進行了討論 - 如何延長這些貸款 - 和提供的具體 - 簡單的 - 是的 - 在會議上 - 好的 - 這不是一個不開始的 - 13個票可以解決問題 - 這就是問題的重點 - 把一些東西 - 不不 - 把一些東西放在一起 - 兩名民主黨人可以支持 - 當約翰遜說他不會做任何事 - 當半個民主黨人 - 甚至不願意拒絕貸款 - 拜託 - 錯誤就在那裡 - 不僅僅是我們 - 他們可以參選 - 這是一個簡單的問題 - 這就是 - 這個題目 - 是的,請說,彼得 - 我只想說 - 唯一的方法 - 你能夠進步的是 - 你能夠具體 - 我們正在提出的就是具體的 - 這可能不是 - 某些民主黨人想解決的問題 - 但是他們並不是具體的 - 而時機正在發動 - 就像麗莎所說的 - 所以這是一個有信心的提議 - 這不意味著 - 如果有具體的反對提議 - 川普總統會與我們談判 - 但是民主黨人真的做得很好 - 而總統也做得很好 - 你無法找到 - 甚至30或50個民主黨人 - 在眾議院 - 甚至10或12個在眾議院 - 說他們同意某些東西 - 所以來吧 - 來吧,這太荒謬了 - 是的 - 我們永遠願意和 - 和那些想減少人們的醫療費用的人談談 - 到目前為止,沒有人要和 - 謝謝大家 - 最後一件事 - 你們都報告了 - 眾議院的民主黨人 - 他們在休假期間 - 我不知道是90天還是120天 - 無論多久,川普總統都把他們留在家裡 - 他們的數量都在鏡頭前 - 說我們需要延長這些稅金 - 你們都報告了 - 你們知道選票存在 - 你們知道 - 他們想要做一年,兩年,三年嗎? - 放進去 - 其實 - 看 - 其實 - 佩洛西·史蒂芬尼克,她是總統 - 她是一位被批評的議員 - 最近她感謝神 - 她有勇氣去做這件事 - 我很欣賞她 - 她告訴他們一年,兩年 - 有人說三年,有的人說一年,有的人說兩年 - 大家這麼興奮的原因是 - 因為他們沒有計劃 - 他們沒有一致性 - 你們在說,為什麼民主黨不做點事? - 我們正在做點事 - 我們正在做最快,最簡單,最簡單的方式 - 把責任扛下美國人的背後 - 他們應該去投票 - 首先,他們必須去投票 - 我們可以在路上討論 - 這是唯一的解決方案 - 避免1月1日的崩塌 - 簡單而言 - 你們知道所有的民主黨人 - 給我看一些 - 對 - 給我們看 - 給我們看一群 - 你們最清楚的 - 把他們拉進來 - 在眾議院 - 總統應該給他們一票 - 把票交給他們 - 總統應該給他們一票 - 他們說什麼關於隱藏 - 你們問過他們嗎? - 隱藏在裡面還是不在裡面? - 問他們 - 謝謝大家 - 謝謝各位 - 為什麼