WASHINGTON - Turns out that at least a pair of Republican U.S. senators believe Sen. David Vitter, R-La., didn't go far enough in proposing legislation to deny federally subsidized health care benefits to members of Congress, their staffs, the president, vice president and their political appointees. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Tex., said during his just ended 21-hour Senate talk in...
WASHINGTON - Turns out that at least a pair of Republican U.S. senators believe Sen. David Vitter, R-La., didn't go far enough in proposing legislation to deny federally subsidized health care benefits to members of Congress, their staffs, the president, vice president and their political appointees.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Tex., said during his just ended 21-hour Senate talk in opposition to the Affordable Care Act that one of his Republican colleagues, unnamed by the senator, advocates expanding the ban to the 2.8 million civilian federal employees.
Said Cruz:
"Another member of our (Republican) conference indicated that if the Vitter amendment were brought up, he would offer an amendment to expand it to all federal employees," Cruz said. "I think that is a terrific rule. Right now, federal employees earn substantially more than the private sector does. I don't think there is any entitlement to take our tax dollars and to live in a privileged condition being a federal employee."
Not unexpectedly, J. David Cox, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal union, reacted strongly to Cruz' statement.
"The Affordable Care Act is not about taking health insurance from the already-insured, it's about giving the 48 million uninsured Americans a chance to buy health insurance they can afford," Cox said Wednesday. "Senator Cruz's ignorance is matched only by his mean-spiritedness."
Cruz went on to say during his marathon talking spree that he agrees with Vitter that, if Congress doesn't repeal the Affordable Care Act, members of Congress should not continue to receive their federal subsidies to purchase insurance on the exchanges being created under the Affordable Care Act for the uninsured to purchase insurance - often with the help of new government subsidies.
"If members of this body are going to go on television and tell the American people: ObamaCare is great, it is good, it is terrific, it is so great, then they should be eager to live under it," Cruz said. That's basically Vitter's position.
But Senate Democrats and some Republicans as well, say Vitter's amendment would treat congressional members and their staffs worse than the public, noting that most employees who work for the government or large employers will continue to get subsidized coverage from their workplaces when the law's exchanges open up next Tuesday.
Cruz conceded during his talk that he supports the Vitter proposal even though he heard from one of his staff members who said she would have to quit without subsidized health insurance because it is vital for her and her family.