Ryan Ray
The Senate’s FHIX 2.0 health care insurance plan carried the day in the upper chamber by a vote of 33-3 Wednesday afternoon. It came after an hours-long session of back-patting and exhortations to the House to join them on their quest for a health care “revolution,” as one senator called it.
Warm feelings and high-minded speeches rang out across the chamber from a chorus of pro-expansion senators.
Sen. Jeff Brandes was not among them.
The Transportation Committee chairman’s fiscal politics always did have affinities with the House, and Brandes explained that his differences with his colleagues came down to money. Specifically, where it comes from.
“My friends have worked really hard on this plan, but I fundamentally don’t agree with the premise that the federal government is going to provide long-term solutions to this,” Brandes said, pointing to the federal debt and deficit.
“They have $18 trillion in debt and a $500 million deficit this year, and we see that growing into the future,” Brandes said. “Everybody understands that something has to be done with entitlements in the future, I don’t believe anybody thinks that means they should be growing them.
“Growing this system at this time is just not a responsible plan for Florida.”
Asked about former Senate President Don Gaetz‘s comments contra budget purists that “the ship had already sailed” and that House mmbers had already irrevocably “lost their virginity” on the issue because a third of their proposed funding originates in the federal government, Brandes stayed on-message, but with a theoretical edge.
“The unfortunate part of that argument is that we’re borrowing all this money,” Brades said. “There isn’t some magical pot of money, there’s no Confederate gold underneath the federal Capitol. We’re borrowing every one of these dollars from future generations. And it’s unfortunate that we have these discussions like this like we’re not.
“Every one of these dollars is borrowed from my kids, my grandkids, and we’re going to be paying the huge debt of this country for years to come.”
In a press gaggle after the Senate’s approval of its health proposal, President Andy Gardiner was asked whether he was “disappointed” the vote was not unanimous.
“Not at all. They’ll go back to their districts and explain their votes to their constituents and we’ll all just go from there,” Gardiner said.
After a rough and contentious Regular Session and no graceful end in sight to the Special Session it necessitated, there are a great number of lawmakers in exactly that same boat.
The proposal’s passage in the House seems, at this juncture, unlikely.
