Obama administration knew of key Obamacare delay in August, emails say

House Republicans released emails Friday that suggest the Obama administration knew as early as August that the small-business exchange tied to Obamacare would not be ready on time.

“Despite this knowledge, the Obama administration waited to finalize the delay until November 27, as Americans across the country were off celebrating Thanksgiving with their loved ones,” the Energy and Commerce Committee said in a press release.

The emails from between July 26 and Aug. 13 suggested the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services knew the federal insurance marketplace, or SHOP, that assists firms of less than 50 workers would not be available until mid-November at best. But they said at the time it would be ready Oct. 1 and did not announce any type of delay until late September.

One email from the lead vendor, CGI Federal, suggested a timeline that started with webinars on Oct. 1 and ended with the SHOP portal going live on Nov. 15.

“Can we sign this with blood?” Henry Chao, the project manager at CMS, wrote back.

Last week, the administration announced a one-year delay of the SHOP feature.

“As the paper trail broadens, we see more and more evidence that the administration was fully aware its signature health care law was not ready for prime time,” Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton, Michigan Repbulican, said. “The documents we are now reviewing tell a much, much different story than what officials testified to Congress.”

Via: Washington Times

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Citing overreach, Republicans ponder new checks on executive powers

Congressional Republicans are considering various options to curb President Obama’s use of executive powers, which they say are excessive.

GOP officials have long claimed that the president has violated the law and the Constitution through administrative actions on issues ranging from immigration to nominations to the U.S. military involvement in Libya.

But the president’s recent move to change ObamaCare through an administrative fix has sparked a new round of discussions within the conservative base and Republicans on Capitol Hill.

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) last week said he was “highly skeptical” Obama could find a fix for the cancellation of health insurance plans that was both “legal and effective.”

“I just don’t see, within the law, their ability to do that,” said the Speaker.

An hour later, Obama was outlining such a change to reporters at the White House.

House Republicans passed a bill that would allow people to keep their health plan. Despite a veto threat, 39 Democrats backed the legislation written by Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.).

“I know there’s a lot of discussion about the validity of the president just unilaterally changing the law. ... There are a lot of us that are very concerned about it,” Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said in an interview with The Hill.

Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.), the chairman of the House Judiciary subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice, said, “We’re exploring options to try to somehow try to rein in this president’s total disregard for the Constitution.”

Via: Huffington Post

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Fred Upton Supports the Landrieu Obamacare Fix. So Does Barack Obama

Erick has made a couple of posts on why supporting Fred Upton’s messaging bill, allowing people to retain insurance policies that are not Obamacare-compliant, is a profoundly bad idea.  (ReadIt’s a Trap!; Yes, It’s a Trap; and Riddle Me This, Republicans). In the process he’s received a significant amount of pushback from the Big Brain Thinkers in the GOP who are convinced that the Upton bill is just too clever for words.

Erick has pointed out that it will be child’s play for Harry Reid to substitute the language in Mary Landrieu’s bill for that in the Upton bill, pass it, and send it back to the House for assignment to a conference committee.

The Upton bill is more of the kabuki theater the Establishment GOP has entertained us with since the government shutdown. Why is it that the same people who were trying so hard to help Obama fix Obamacare in October are suddenly interested in killing Obamacare today? The short answer is that they aren’t.

Fred Upton has said he supports Mary Landrieu’s bill. Barack Obama feels the same way.

That should tell you all you need to know about how useful Upton’s bill is to the cause of killing Obamacare.

Via: Red State

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Sebelius apologizes for ObamaCare site failures during Hill hearing

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius personally apologized Wednesday for the failures of the ObamaCare website, saying during a Capitol Hill hearing that the American people "deserve better." 

"Access to HealthCare.gov has been a miserably frustrating experience for way too many Americans," Sebelius said, vowing to fix the problems. 

To the American people, she said, "You deserve better. I apologize. I'm accountable to you for fixing these problems." 

She later said: "Hold me accountable for the debacle. I'm responsible." 

The secretary faced of her biggest critics Wednesday as she testified for the first time on the troubled ObamaCare rollout -- amid mounting calls for her resignation. 

"The news seems to get worse by the day," Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said at the start of the hearing before his committee.   

Not only was the secretary facing questions about the glitch-ridden exchange website, but the administration as a whole is being challenged as consumers on the individual market receive a wave of cancellation notices. 

Via Fox News

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Weekly Republican Address: Chairman Fred Upton on ObamaCare Oversight & Fairness For All - Saturday October 26, 2013

WASHINGTON, DC – Delivering the Weekly Republican Address, House Energy & Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) highlights efforts to provide fairness for all Americans under the president’s health care law, and get to the bottom of what went wrong with its rollout.  With his committee set to hear from Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on Wednesday, Upton notes that "the bipartisan chorus has been growing ... to delay the penalty that Americans would face for being unable to purchase insurance through this broken system.”

At the end of the address – recorded in the committee’s hearing room – Upton asks Americans facing hardships from the president’s health care law to visit gop.gov/YourStory to share their experiences.

Via: Speaker.gov