Rod Blum: Congress will act on health care this year

CEDAR RAPIDS, Ia. — Efforts to reform the health care law known as Obamacare are ongoing in Washington and will result in a plan to lower insurance premiums for Iowans, U.S. Rep. Rod Blum pledged on Wednesday.

Blum, the Republican representing northeastern Iowa, was a “no” vote on the GOP proposal offered as a replacement to the Affordable Care Act and then abandoned last month when it became clear it would not pass.

On Wednesday, he couched that opposition largely as a disagreement over process: the bill was advanced too quickly with insufficient debate, he said, and ultimately did too little to reduce premiums for people who get health care through their employer.

“People who are working, paying the taxes in this country, I want to see them have a decrease in their health insurance premiums,” Blum said. Such savings, he added, can be achieved by “getting rid of insane regulations and mandates and rules in the insurance industry.”

Discussions on a new bill are already underway, Blum said, promising that the House would put forward a “better bill” sometime in 2017.

“Do you want this right or do you want it tomorrow?” Blum asked. “I want it right.”

He also voiced support for what he said where “Democrat ideas” — reimporting cheaper prescription drugs from Canada and allowing the government to negotiate down the price of drugs for patients in federal health care programs.

Blum’s delivered his remarks Wednesday to the Iowa Conservative Union, a gun-rights group that hosts a monthly “Open Carry Night” at a Godfather’s Pizza in Cedar Rapids. The group rented out the pizzeria’s entire dining room for Blum’s visit, drawing about 60 supporters — several of whom carried holstered handguns under their arms or on their hips.

Gun rights didn’t come up. Beyond explaining his position on health care reform, Blum described his views on reforming Congress — he’s for term limits and would ban lobbying by former lawmakers — and cutting business taxes.

He also expressed support for last week’s military strike on Syria while ruling out further engagement with the ongoing civil war there.

“To put our nation’s finest young men and women in harm’s way there or to continue to bomb there without congressional approval is wrong,” Blum said. “(The president) needs to come to Congress if he wants to do that and I hope and pray he doesn’t. It’s a civil war, and we don’t belong in it.”

The event put Blum in front of constituents, but it wasn’t a public meeting open to anyone — a fact underscored by Iowa Conservative Union volunteers who checked IDs against a guest list as people came through the door.

Iowa Conservative Union Chairman James Conklin all but acknowledged the security measures — jokingly referred to as “extreme vetting” in a Facebook post advertising the meeting — were aimed at keeping out people looking to challenge Blum.

“I want to enjoy my evening with like-minded people,” Conklin told the group. “If we have any extra seats, we can have renegades come in. But guess what? I don’t see a lot of extra seats. This is supposed to be for people celebrating the Bill of Rights.”

Across the street, about 20 people turned out for a counter-demonstration sponsored by the Iowa Democratic Party to highlight the closed nature of the event and Blum’s sparse calendar of public forums. Among them was Robin Stone, a mental health worker from Manchester who held a sign depicting Blum with a closed zipper over his mouth.

“He refuses to talk to his constituents,” said Stone, who said she’s part of a group called the Manchester Area Progressive Alliance. “We may not have voted for him, but he still represents us.”

Earlier on Wednesday, Blum’s office announced that he would hold open town meetings next month in Dubuque, Cedar Rapids, Marshalltown and the Cedar Falls/Waterloo area.