only afford treatment to get him out from under his devastating addiction. somewhere in america, there s a parent whose child has cancer and mother and father who stay up late at night worried their insurance will either not be available or run out when the family needs it most. the america that my republican friends envision with this health care bill, those americans and many more beside might not get the coverage and care they need. we live in the wealthiest country on earth. surely, surely we can do better than what the republican health care bill promises. and now i have a unanimous consent request. going to have to from asking questions until we finish our
immigrants and leprosy. i think the science is pretty well dictated if that regard, too. let me ask you this, one of the most beneficial components of the affordable care act was the expansion of the medicaid program, that resulted in 11 million people nationwide and over 500,000 in new jersey gaining coverage, many for the first time. it s one of the biggest programs on the republican chopping block, with prems to not only repeal the affordable care s medicaid expansion, but going further and gutting billions in federal funding to the states. there s no doubt that this would result in catastrophic loss of coverage for tens of millions of low-income families and lead to tens of billions in losses to safety net and other health care providers. do you recognize medicaid to be a valuable program and consider the coverage it provides to 74 million americans to be comprehensive? medicaid is a vital program for health care for many individuals in this country, but one that has significant
going to be left to congressman price, which i think is why the question was asked about would there be people who would lose coverage. and i think, you know, there s been a lot of data on this. this was sort of a loaded question, as you well know. the congressional budget office has released estimates if there s an repeal of the affordable care act. in year one, year two, year three. they say some 30 million more people within a few years would not have health care coverage. i think that that s what was really getting at. what congressman price has said to that question in the past, he didn t really answer it today, is that those numbers did not anticipate the replacement plan he has and his replacement plan would not lead to that sort of loss of coverage. he has never said it wouldn t lead to loss of coverage at all. sanjay, stand by. we re going back to the hearing. what do you think, how is congressman price handling these
medicaid patients, who are not taking any medicaid patients. there s a reason for that. if we re honest with ourselves, we would be asking the question why. well, if that s the case that one in three don t treat medicaid, you have to ask yourself, is that because medicaid reimbursements are so low? and since provider reimbursements are set at a state level, won t cutting federal funding and hitting states with higher costs only lead to lower provider rates? and how many doctors would actually treat former medicaid beneficiaries when they no longer have any coverage or ability to pay? so even if there s only one of three, there s still two of three that are providing the services. imagine if you don t have coverage, which goes to my next question. you have advocated to, in essence, block grant medicaid. the essence of medicaid is an entitlement, which under the law it means, if i meet these ci
questions, largely tough questions from the democrats? tough questions from the democrats, not so much from the republicans. i think he s handling it well in terms of the theater of this. he insists he s done nothing wrong. i ve not seen anything that will put his nomination in jeopardy. ultimately, this is going to be a party line vote. ultimately, republicans will rally around him. he s very popular among republicans on capitol hill. of course, he has been a republican congressman on the other side of congress, on the house side, for several years. i can t imagine, even with these ethical concerns and even with democrats, fighting the obamacare repeal tooth and nail, i can t imagine him not getting confirmed. i agree. let s go back to the hearing right now. and i think it s important, individuals ought to be able to purchase the coverage they want. i just don t want us to get to a place people have to settle for something that no one else