GOP bills go after Obamacare, with more on the way
By Paige Winfield Cunningham | January 25, 2015 | 5:00 am
It’s doubtful whether any of the bills targeting Obamacare that Republicans are advancing will ever become law, since Obama has threatened to veto them. But they do help show which parts of the healthcare law the GOP will complain about the most and where they’re winning some Democrats over.
So far, the House has voted four times this month to change parts of the Affordable Care Act, adding to the dozens of bills it has approved in the last five years to modify the law or repeal it entirely. Two of the bills tweaking the law’s employer mandate were noncontroversial and approved unanimously.
Not so for the other two measures, which were passed largely along partisan lines. One changes the law’s definition of full-time work, while the other bans subsidized Obamacare plans from covering abortion.
The Senate hasn’t jumped into the debate with its new GOP majority. But Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has said the workweek bill, which raises the threshold at which workers may qualify for employer-sponsored coverage from 30 hours a week to 40, is a top priority, along with a bill from Sen. Orrin Hatch repealing the law’s medical device tax.
“I don't expect a great deal of bipartisanship on the revisitation of Obamacare, but we're going to do that,” McConnell said this week. “And people have an opportunity to see how the new majority in the Senate feels about that unfortunate piece of legislation.”
Advocates for the workweek bill say that keeping the benchmark at 30 hours will result in employees' hours being cut to just below that line. The requirement to offer coverage kicked in just for larger employers this year, but will extend to employers with more than 50 workers starting next year. A dozen House Democrats voted for the measure earlier this month, but so far the Senate version has only two Democratic sponsors: Sens. Joe Donnelly of Indiana and Joe Manchin of West Virginia.
Senate Republicans drew attention to the bill on Thursday with a committee hearing. But they would need at least another four Democrats to support the measure to reach the 60 votes necessary to avoid a filibuster.
And with some conservatives saying the bill would cause even more workers’ hours to be cut, to just below 40 hours a week, getting all the Senate GOP on board could be tricky.
A few more Democrats are supporting legislation repealing the medical device tax, which applies to manufacturers of devices such as X-ray equipment, pacemakers and surgical gloves. Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken of Minnesota, Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire — along with Donnelly — joined Republicans earlier this month to tout it.
President Obama has threatened to veto both bills, creating a rocky road for lawmakers who hope the measures will become law. But the reality hasn’t stopped Republicans from steadily churning out legislation and using repeal votes to press their opposition to the law.
This week a top Senate Republican — Orrin Hatch of Utah, who leads the powerful Finance Committee — introduced a bill to ditch the law’s requirement to buy health coverage, known as the “individual mandate.” He joined with Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., and more than a dozen other Republicans to roll it out.
Hatch soon will bring back a bill to repeal the law’s requirement on employers to provide workers with affordable health coverage, known as the "employer mandate," his staff says.
He also has reintroduced two bills this Congress that would do away with the law’s new sales health insurance tax, which the insurance industry has long complained will force them to raise premiums, as well as the medical device tax.
In 2013, House GOP leaders held a vote on repealing the entire Affordable Care Act, even though the chamber had passed it before. The newly elected members demanded their own chance to vote on full repeal.
It’s not clear whether leadership will bring up another repeal measure in the new Congress. Currently, they’re still deciding on what kind of Obamacare-related legislation to bring to the floor next, aides say.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/gop-bills-go-after-obamacare-with-more-on-the-way/article/2559200
