[March
06, 2014]By David Morgan and Thomas Ferraro
WASHINGTON (Reuters)
— The Republican-led U.S.
House of Representatives voted on Wednesday to delay for one year
the tax penalty Americans will pay under President Barack Obama's
healthcare law if they decline to enroll in health coverage.
The vote, part of a Republican election-year attack
strategy against the 2010 healthcare law known as Obamacare, marked
the 50th time House Republicans had passed legislation to try to
repeal or dismantle it.
The measure to delay the tax penalty passed by a vote of 250-160,
with 27 Democrats joining with 223 Republicans to back the
legislation. The bill is certain to go nowhere in the
Democratic-controlled Senate and would face a White House veto even
if it succeeded.
The 27 Democratic votes on Wednesday for the bill fell short of the
39 who broke ranks with the White House last November and voted with
Republicans in favor of a failed bill that would have allowed health
insurers to continue to sell plans canceled under Obamacare.
Supporters of the new bill cast the legislation as an issue of
fairness.
They argued that individual consumers should be granted a delay on
the penalty because the Obama administration had postponed the
implementation of some Obamacare provisions that apply to
businesses.
"This is an opportunity to stop the political games and put working
Americans first," said House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, a Virginia
Republican.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a
California Democrat, said after 50 such votes, "It's time for
Republicans to end their obsession with upending health reform and
work with Democrats to strengthen it."
Analysts say a delay on the penalty would undermine the law's aim
of extending health coverage to millions of uninsured Americans by
destabilizing new private insurance marketplaces established on the
expectation the penalty would encourage people to enroll in
coverage.
More than 4 million people have already enrolled in private
insurance through the marketplaces. The open enrollment period ends
on March 31.
One of Obamacare's most unpopular provisions, the individual mandate
requires most Americans to be enrolled in health coverage by March
31 or pay a tax penalty that is being phased in over three years.
(Reporting by David Morgan and Thomas
Ferraro; editing by Peter Cooney and Andrew Hay)
