WASHINGTON – U.S. Congresswoman Candice Miller (MI-10) today issued the following statement after the White House hosted a health care “summit” with Members of Congress:

“I applaud President Obama for holding today’s health care summit because it gave the American people an opportunity to better understand the differences between the Republican and Democrat approaches to health care reform. For the last year, we have been hearing from Democrats that Republicans do not have a plan and nothing could be further from the truth.

“Republicans have been putting forward a common sense, market-based approach to lower costs, such as allowing individuals and groups to purchase health care across state lines and enacting real malpractice reform to remove the need for doctors to practice defensive medicine, just to name a few. These reforms could be enacted tomorrow, would begin lowering costs immediately, and would not cost federal taxpayers one dollar and in fact would save tax dollars.

“Unfortunately, it seems that President Obama and Congressional Democrats are ready to double down on their massive government intrusion into health care, a plan that has been rejected by a large majority of the American people. This plan also includes a mandate that individuals purchase health insurance or face tax penalties or jail. I believe this to be an unconstitutional provision that I cannot support.

“I hope in the coming days that the President and his congressional allies will stop and review the ideas the Republican’s put forward, stop the rush to approve this terribly flawed legislation and join us in our offer to start over.”

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