Obamacare Continues to Disappoint

It is becoming even more clear that Obamacare is a failure. Consumers have fewer choices. Government-sponsored insurance companies are failing and costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, and others are threatening to stop providing coverage through Obamacare. Health care costs are rising and Obamacare continues to interfere with the doctor-patient relationship. Fixing this broken health care system must be a top priority when Congress returns to Washington in January.

Looking ahead to next year, health insurance companies are deciding if they want to continue to participate in Obamacare exchanges and more and more insurers are jumping ship. According to The Hill newspaper, "This fall, more than a dozen health insurers representing 800,000 people have dropped out of the ObamaCare exchanges..." UnitedHealth, the largest insurer in the country covering 500,000 people, has recently announced they would probably not participate in the Obamacare exchange next year. Since joining the exchange, United Healthcare has lost $425 million on insurance plans sold through the exchanges. United Healthcare CEO Stephen Hemsley said, "We cannot sustain these losses. We can't really subsidize a marketplace that doesn't appear at the moment to be sustaining itself." It is unreasonable to expect businesses to take such huge losses and continue to provide services. These are results we could have predicted when the Democrats interfered with the free market.

In order to help fix the health care crisis, we must replace Obamacare with market-based solutions that provide people with access to the affordable quality care they deserve. It's clear that our current president has no interest in actually improving the state of health care for hardworking folks that have been forced to purchase inadequate insurance that does not fit their needs or allow them to see their doctors.

Individuals should have the ability to choose their own doctor. They should be able to purchase affordable, high-quality health care insurance that provides a safety net for their family. President Obama's refusal to accept reasonable changes to his namesake health care law shows that he cares more about protecting his legacy than fixing access to health care in a way which doesn't drive up our nation's debt while increasing costs to American families.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recently reported that by 2025 Obamacare will cost the economy an equivalent of 2 million full-time jobs. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Sylvia Burwell, head of the government agency tasked with administering the bulk of Obamacare, estimates enrollment numbers are severely below their original projections. In a March report, the CBO estimated that by the end of next year, 21 million people would have insurance through a federal exchange, but the HHS Secretary now admits that at best only 10 million Americans will have coverage by then.

The Obama administration is trying to mislead, and deceive the American people on the merits of this law. You elected me to put a major repeal of Obamacare on the president's desk and to force him to answer the question, "Whose best interest do you have at heart?" If President Obama vetoes our repeal he will be answering loud and clear, "I chose my own interests over those of hardworking Americans."