During a House Ways and Means Committee hearing held before the congressional recess, Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA) questioned healthcare witnesses about GOP-backed funding policies and their effect on treatment to patients.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Mr. Byer, you're recognized.
00:02Mr. Chairman, thank you very much and thank all of you for hanging in here.
00:06It's been really encouraging to hear many good ideas about how to provide better services
00:11to patients in those latter years of their life.
00:14And I really want to thank you for being here to discuss supporting older Americans.
00:19Today, more than ever, Americans work into the later years,
00:22and these changing conditions require new methods of support.
00:26I'll lead a bill to establish an Older Workers Bureau within the Department of Labor
00:29supporting our older workers, ensuring they have the resources they need to succeed.
00:34You probably know this is the fastest-growing sector of our workforce,
00:38and those resources are needed to confront the unique challenges that older workers face,
00:43things like work-limiting health conditions or financially preparing for retirement.
00:48And for many older Americans, that difficult balance is only made possible
00:52because we have critical federal programs like Social Security and Medicare.
00:57Mr. Carlson, I would like to thank you specifically for discussing the importance of Medicaid to older Americans,
01:03which is so often overlooked.
01:06And I'm deeply concerned that my Republican friends and colleagues are pushing a defunding bill
01:11that actively attacks older Americans.
01:14We're expecting to vote on that bill in just a few minutes.
01:17This is far from a clean bill.
01:19The partisan measure strips away $13 billion from essential non-defense programs and services.
01:25That includes cuts to critical medical research, cuts to emergency programs,
01:30and even specific cuts to veterans' medical benefits.
01:33The bill would cut $280 million in research for treatments and cures for Alzheimer's,
01:39despite the fact that 50% of Americans 85 and older will get Alzheimer's or dementia.
01:46It cuts research for heart disease, kidney disease, diabetes,
01:49and many more serious health conditions that disproportionately affect older Americans.
01:54It cuts more money from USDA's Commodity Supplemental Food Program,
01:57leaving 25,000 older Americans unable to participate,
02:02denying them emergency assistance at a time when food prices are still rising.
02:07And it omits nearly $23 billion in planned funding for the Toxic Exposures Fund
02:11to care for veterans exposed to burn pits, Agent Orange, and other toxic substances.
02:16Those veterans, most of whom, many of whom were exposed to toxic substances in Vietnam,
02:21are older Americans, and they are disproportionately older
02:24and face severe health impacts from their sacrifices for our country.
02:28And this bill doesn't stop there.
02:30Because it lacks any guardrails, it allows the Trump-Musk-Vance administration
02:35to continue to stop funding, to impound funding,
02:38or redirect funds away from even more programs for older Americans,
02:42including home assistance, mental health care, rural health care, and cancer programs.
02:50And that's not to mention the budget resolution that the House Republicans have passed
02:54to set up reconciliation.
02:56To pay for PAC streaks for the wealthy, they're looking for $2.5 trillion in cuts,
03:01and they charge the Energy and Commerce Committee here in the House,
03:04the one that oversees Medicaid, with $880 billion of those cuts.
03:08The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that those cuts
03:11were not possible without touching Medicaid,
03:15which I look at, 162,000 Virginians, over 65, depend upon.
03:20I held a Medicaid roundtable last week in Alexandria, last Friday.
03:24We had nursing home managers and owners there.
03:26They said it was impossible for them to survive if Medicaid were cut.
03:32So, Mr. Carlson, a simple existential question.
03:34Put all this together.
03:36Is it possible to make cuts of this magnitude
03:38without undermining the care that older Americans rely upon?
03:44The simple answer is no.
03:46The program could not survive in a reasonable fashion
03:50given the cuts that have been proposed.
03:55Well, that's enough.
03:58Mr. Chairman, then, I yield back.