1. No Erectile Dysfunction Drugs To Sex Offenders (Amendment 3556) – This amendment would enact recommendations from the Government Accountability Office to stop fraudulent payments for prescription drugs prescribed by dead providers or, to dead patients. This amendment also prohibits coverage of Viagra and other ED medications to convicted child molesters, rapists, and sex offenders, and prohibits coverage of abortion drugs.

Click here to view the amendment text and click here for additional background.

2. Bureaucrat Cap and Trade (Amendment 3557) – This amendment would ensure that no provisions in the health bill increase the size of government bureaucracies in Washington, D.C. This amendment requires that for each government bureaucrat added to a government agency as a result of this act, there must be a corresponding decrease in a government bureaucrat at that agency. The federal government should not grow the bureaucracy in Washington, DC when one in 10 Americans is looking for work and twice as many are underemployed. 

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3. Congress Should Not Lecture Americans About Fiscal Responsibility (Amendment 3563) - This amendment would strike the creation of a new $375 million government program the new health bill (The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act) intended to promote personal and financial responsibility. It is ironic that Congress, that amassed a $12 trillion deficit, should lecture Americans about financial responsibility. This government “responsibility” program duplicates existing government programs and adds hundreds of millions of dollars to the tax burden funds. In short, there is nothing responsible about the new responsibility program.

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4. Repeal New Powers Given to the Secretary of HHS (Amendment 3558) - Nearly 1,700 times in the new health bill (The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act), the Secretary of HHS is given new authorities to write regulations, issue definitions, and decide on the fate of Americans’ health care. Congress should be empowering patients and physicians, not bureaucrats in Washington, DC.

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5. If You Like the Health Plan You Have, You Can Keep It (Amendment 3559) - President Obama promised that Americans who like their health care plan would be able to keep it. However, the Congressional Budget Office has said that millions of people will lose their current coverage under The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Unfortunately, for many Americans, the reconciliation bill is even worse news, as it made changes to some grandfathering provisions. The changes to grandfathering provisions would mean that individuals with guaranteed renewable plans in the individual market will NOT be able to keep their current coverage at the current price, but would immediately be issued a new policy and charged more. This amendment strikes changes to grandfathered plans, so Americans who like the health care they have actually can keep it. 

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6. Implement Republican Ideas President Obama Has Endorsed To Crack Down on Waste, Fraud, and Abuse (Amendment 3560) - The President’s Proposal for health reform, released on February 22, 2010, highlighted nine Republican ideas to combat waste, fraud, and abuse. This amendment includes each of those policy provisions which have been endorsed by President Obama. Certainly Washington politicians should be serious about stemming the hemorrhaging of taxpayer dollars lost to waste, fraud, and abuse. Senators will have an opportunity to vote on proposals which have received bipartisan support, and which the President has endorsed.

Click here to view amendment. Click here to read the proposal. Click here  for additional background.

7. Abortion Conscience Amendment (Amendment 3561) - This amendment would ensure health care providers are not forced to participate in abortions or discriminated against because they choose not to perform abortions. The federal government should never require health care providers to violate their deeply held moral, ethical or religious beliefs or discriminate against them because they choose to exercise their consciences and not be involved with abortion. This amendment would protect health care providers from being required or coerced to perform abortions. 

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8. Exempt Class I Medical Devices from New Taxation. Taxing latex gloves and band-aids is not health reform and only increases the cost of health care for patients. This amendment would exempt all Class I medical devices – such as band-aids, wheelchairs, hospital beds, and surgical gowns – from new federal taxation. 

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9.  Motion to Commit Bill to Committee and Return In Compliance with President Obama’s Promises. During his presidential campaign, then-Senator Obama repeatedly made several promises related to what health reform would accomplish. The bill he signed today breaks those promises. This amendment would send the reconciliation bill back to the Finance Committee and direct the Committee to report back out a bill which would allow him to keep his promise.

Click here to view amendment. Click here to view President Obama's health care promises.

10. Highly Qualified Bureaucrats in the Department of Education Office of Federal Student Aid (Amendment 3649) - As the U.S. Department of Education prepares to become one of the world’s largest banks, this amendment holds government bureaucrats to the same high standards applied to U.S. teachers by requiring each employee within the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Federal Student Aid to become “Highly Qualified” in fiscal management.

This amendment requires each employee within the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Federal Student Aid to become “Highly Qualified” in fiscal management by earning a bachelor’s degree in finance or business management/administration within six years of the date of enactment.

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11. No Blank Tax Payer Check for Student Loans (Amendment 3648) - To better protect the federal fiscal interest, this amendment implements a suggestion of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to require the U.S. Department of Education to pay for unanticipated costs of the Direct Loan program through increases to the student loan origination fee.

This amendment implements a suggestion of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to require the U.S. Department of Education to pay for unanticipated costs of the Direct Loan program, as reported by OMB in annual program re-estimates, through annual calibrations to the student loan origination fee.

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12. Ensuring Pell Grant Proposal Is Paid For (Amendment 3650) - This amendment ensures that expanded Pell Grant benefits rely on realized “savings” projected to result from the move to 100% Direct Lending and not on deficit spending.

The amendment requires the Pell Grant “add on” (i.e., the mandatory addition above the discretionary award base) to be reduced each year by an amount that reflects any increased Direct Loan program costs.

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13. Protects the Second Amendment rights of veterans (Amendment 3687) - This bill protects veterans from being denied their Second Amendment rights without due process. Specifically, veterans who are considered mentally incompetent for purposes of assigning benefit payments, may not be considered “adjudicated as a mental defective” unless they have been found by a judicial authority to be a danger to themselves or to others. Currently, these veterans are immediately considered “adjudicated as a mental defective” and lose their rights to possess and purchase firearms even though they are no danger to themselves or others. According to CRS, Over 140,000 veterans have been added to a national database of those prohibited from owning or purchasing a firearm. This bill is endorsed by the American Legion, the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States, AMVETS, the Military Order of the Purple Heart, Gun Owners of America, the NRA, and the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

Click here to view amendment text. Click here for additional background.

14. Prohibits Members of Congress from receiving a pay increase until the budget is balanced (Amendment 3689) - This amendment freezes the pay of Members of Congress until they balance the U.S. government’s budget. Members of Congress are paid an annual salary of $174,000 and, under a law passed by Congress, that amount is automatically increased every year. This amendment would block this automatic congressional pay raise until Congress stops borrowing money to pay for its excessive spending.

Click here to view amendment text. Click here to view additional background.