U.S. House and Senate Each Said They Had Only 45 Employees--Then Signed Up 12,359 for Insurance on Obamacare 'Small-Business' Exchange

 (CNSNews.com) – Both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives certified that they had only 45 employees each in order to sign up for the District of Columbia’s Small Business Exchange. But 12,359 - or 86 percent of the exchange's enrollees - are members of Congress, congressional staff members, and their spouses and dependents, according to an appeal filed with the D.C. Court of Appeals by Judicial Watch.

The public interest law firm announced Monday that it is appealing the February dismissal of its lawsuit challenging congressional participation in the Obamacare exchange even though the D.C. Exchange Act limits enrollment to small companies with 50 or fewer employees.

“Congress obviously has far more than 50 employees,” Judicial Watch attorney Michael Bekesha pointed out in his opening brief. “It has thousands of employees.”

Congress enrolled in the small business exchange when its previous coverage under the Federal Employee Health Benefits plan was terminated by the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and congressional employees stood to lose thousands of dollars in “employer contributions” if they enrolled in the District’s individual exchange.

According to documents obtained by Judicial Watch through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives both certified that they “employ 50 or fewer full time equivalent employees.”

In October 2013, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issued a final rule that provides an “employer contribution” covering about three-quarters of the premiums of congressional employees enrolled in the small business exchange starting Jan. 1, 2014.

The OPM rule “allowed at least 12,359 congressional employees and their spouses and dependents to obtain health insurance through the Small Business Exchange…These 12,359 participants represent an astonishing 86% of the Small Business Exchange’s total enrollment,” the appeal states.

Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit last October on behalf of Kirby Vining, a D.C. resident since 1986, who objected to the expenditure of municipal funds to insure congressional employees in an exchange that was established specifically for small employers in the District.

“Congress authored the law [ACA], and is going to rather questionable lengths to avoid compliance with the law it drafted,” Vining said.

D.C. resident Kirby Vining. (CNSNews.com/Penny Starr)

Although the D.C. Health Benefit Exchange Authority conceded that D.C. law limits participation in the exchange to small employers, it argued in court that “the local statute must yield to the extent the federal statute or regulation applies.”

In its motion to dismiss the case, the authority also stated that the exchange “has been funded exclusively by federal grants awarded to the District to establish its Exchange, and more recently, an assessment imposed on health carriers doing business in the District.”

In dismissing the lawsuit, D.C. Superior Court Judge Herbert Dixon ruled that Vining had no standing to challenge the OPM rule because he “has not demonstrated a reasonable inference that municipal taxpayer funds have been appropriated to defendant exchange authority to establish a cognizable injury to maintain standing to bring his underlying complaint.”

However, in a budget report submitted to Congress, the Exchange Authority’s actual budget for Fiscal Year 2013 ($10.9 million) and FY 2014 ($66.1 million) was identified as " ‘municipal monies’ as originating from the District’s General Fund. No monies are identified as Federal Funds, Private Revenue, or Intra-District Funds,” according to the appeal.

“In Fiscal Year 2015, the Exchange Authority’s budget was reclassified from the General Fund to a newly created fund, separate and distinct from ‘Federal Funds’,” it continued.

Dixon also ruled that the OPM rule preempts the D.C. Exchange Act, noting that “allowing members of Congress and their staff to participate in the District’s small business health options program is authorized by federal regulations.”

But Judicial Watch argues in its appeal that the D.C. law cannot be preempted because it is “completely consistent and entirely compatible” with the federal law and in fact its “sole purpose is to implement various provisions of ACA.”

“In reality, the court ruled that a determination by a federal bureaucrat – in this instance, the director of OPM – trumps the 50-employee limit of the Exchange Act, at least with respect to Congress,” the group’s appeal brief stated. “No lawful regulation – much less a regulation that purports to delegate such authority to an agency head – can do that, and the Court cites no legal authority whatsoever for their astonishing conclusion that it can.”

Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton said that allowing Congress to enroll in an exchange meant for small businesses is both “unlawful and unethical.”

“It is an abuse of District taxpayers to use D.C. funds to subsidize illegal health insurance for Congress,” Fitton said in a statement.  “It is unlawful and unethical for District officials to use local dollars to participate in Congress’s Obamacare fraud. 

“The highest court in the District of Columbia must affirm the right of District taxpayers to protect their monies from being misappropriated by corrupt District officials.”

Via: CNS News

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'Pro-Science' Democrats Reject Biotechnology

I crush GMOs!

Imagine if Congress voted on whether or not to teach evolution and climate change in school. And imagine that 73% of Republicans voted against it. The backlash would be easy to predict: The national media, and science journalists in particular, would spend a week making somber declarations of impending educational and scientific collapse that would reverberate across the cosmos.

As it so happens, Congress did just vote on something of tremendous scientific importance: Biotechnology. And, as it so happens, 73% of Democrats voted against the bill. Yet, the national media remained deafeningly and hypocritically silent. 

On July 23, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill, H.R. 1599, that, among other things, would block states from requiring foods containing genetically modified ingredients to carry special labels. From a scientific viewpoint, this is the correct policy. Yet, the Democratic Party, which has branded itself the "pro-science" party over the last two decades, overwhelmingly opposed it.

Why? Well, it's hard to say, though the fact that places like the GMO-hating Whole Foods tending to be located in counties that voted for Barack Obama might have something to do with it.

In the final vote tally, 94% of House Republicans supported the bill, while a stunning 73% of Democrats voted against it. Even Democrats who represent districts with a large biotechnology constituency voted against the bill: Nancy Pelosi (CA-12), Jackie Speier (CA-14), Mike Honda (CA-17), and Anna Eshoo (CA-18) -- all from the Bay Area -- as well as Boston's Michael Capuano (MA-7) and Stephen Lynch (MA-8) and Seattle's Jim McDermott (WA-7).

The vote pattern made it abundantly clear: On the needlessly hot-button issue of genetic modification, Democrats sided with fearmongers and organic foodies, while Republicans sided with the medical and scientific mainstream.

And yes, just like vaccines, evolution, and anthropogenic climate change, GMOs are mainstream and non-controversial in the scientific community. Indeed, the American Medical Association (AMA) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) (PDF) -- organizations that represent our nation's finest doctors and scientists -- reject GMO labels.

But don't just take their word for it. A massive literature review published in 2013 in the journalCritical Review of Biotechnology, which examined 1,783 papers on the topic, found that GMOs were safe for humans and the environment. In other words, the scientific community is solidly united behind the science of genetic modification; in fact, the toxic C-word, "consensus," is entirely appropriate.

Unfortunately, Democratic politicians aren't the only ideologues who are opposed to GMOs. The $72-billion organic food industry is, too. And anti-GMO activists, such as Gary Ruskin, use the legal system to harass academic scientists. His group, U.S. Right to Know, abuses FOIA requests in order to smear the reputation of honest biotech scientists. And who serves on hisBoard of Directors? None other than former Democratic Party apparatchik, Lisa Graves, who is now Executive Director of the far left-wing propaganda outlet, Center for Media and Democracy.

Our food is precious. Labels are meant for nutritional and health purposes, not for scoring political points against Monsanto or buttressing Luddite protests against biotechnology.

Let us hope that President Obama and the U.S. Senate can unite behind a bipartisan victory for science and approve the House bill.

Via: Real Clear Science

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Watchdog: Government failing to fully screen Obamacare applications

The Obama administration failed to properly review whether some Obamacare applicants were U.S. citizens or in jail, two factors that should disqualify people from getting health insurance under the law, according to a scathing report from a federal watchdog.

The finding of ineffective screening for applicants came about a month after an undercover operation discovered that fake applications were able to enroll in Obamacare and get subsidies. The report could also spark further outcry from Republicans in Congress, who have claimed for years that the administration has poorly managed the exchanges.

The review, conducted by the Health and Human Services' Office of the Inspector General, looked at 90 applications to Obamacare. They also interviewed marketplace officials and reviewed other documentation.

A slew of problems were discovered while reviewing the applications, including whether the applicant was in jail, the report said.

"Not all of the federal marketplace's internal controls were effective in ensuring that individuals were determined eligible for enrollment in QHPs and eligible for insurance affordability programs according to federal requirements," the report said.

Other inadequate controls included failing to not always properly verify Social Security numbers, citizenship, family size and annual household income, which helps determine the amount of subsidies an applicant could receive.

The report said it also identified weaknesses in the federal marketplace's procedures for resolving inconsistencies. For instance, the marketplace resolved differences in annual household income using a different method than the one it's supposed to be using, the report said.

The watchdog called on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which manage the federal exchange, to adopt several reforms. Among them are to improve procedures related to resolving inconsistencies and improve its methods for rooting out problems in an application.

The agency concurred with its recommendations and has either taken or planned to address the measures.

Via: Washington Examiner

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[VIDEO] Everybody Has To Pay This New Obamacare Tax

All Americans who bought health insurance policies this year – not just those enrolled in Obamacare – face a 41 percent increase in excise taxes because of hidden fees contained in an obscure section of the Affordable Care Act, according to an investigation by The Daily Caller News Foundation.

Virtually everyone who pays for health care insurance this year will be affected by the tax. The little-known tax was imposed on all consumers regardless of whether they obtained their insurance through Obamacare or through their employer or as individuals in the private market.

This year the tax will cost individuals more than $500 in extra premiums according to one actuarial estimate. Families who purchased insurance will see their premiums go up by more than $700.

The new tax also hits senior citizens who rely on Medicare Part D and Medicare Advantage. It will land on the nation’s poor who depend upon Medicaid-managed care programs.

The 41 percent sticker shock increase doesn’t stop in 2015, however. Over the next four years, the statutorily mandated Obamacare fees are expected to double again.

Over the next decade, consumers will pay more than $145 billion for the tax, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The levy will continue to go up each and every year into the future.

The tax was buried by congressional authors in section 9010 of the law and was envisioned as a way to raise future funds to pay for Obamacare.

The Obamacare fees were designed by the program’s authors to be delayed, kicking in only in 2014 at $8 billion and mushrooming into a $14.3 billion annual price tag on insurance policies by 2018.

Republican Sen. John Barrasso, who favors repeal of section 9010, said the tax “is another example of how the president’s health care law was designed so the most painful parts of the law kick in years later.”

CBO reported the fee was a “statutorily fixed” amount that must be collected each year from consumers, as opposed to a percentage rate.

The statute describes the levy is an “annual fee” but health-care economists say it has been commonly referred to as an excise tax.

The Joint Committee on Taxation said the Obamacare tax was “similar to an excise tax based on the sales price of health insurance contracts.”

Via: Daily Caller

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FreedomWorks’ Congressman of the Month - John Fleming August 2015

Each month, FreedomWorks will spotlight a Member of Congress who embodies our key principles of less government, lower taxes, and more freedom. For the inaugural edition of FreedomWorks’ Congressman of the Month program, we’re highlighting Rep. John Fleming of Louisiana. Fleming was one of the first to join the House Freedom Caucus, and has been a consistent voice for liberty in Congress, since he was first elected in 2008.

A physician by trade, Fleming has demonstrated a willingness to lead on the health care debate that many of his colleagues lack. In 2013, he worked with the Republican Study Committee to introduce the American Health Care Reform Act, one of the most conservative alternatives to ObamaCare to b seriously proposed. Fleming was also a key player in the 2013 fight to defund ObamaCare.

Fleming’s opposition to ObamaCare has not weakened. Last month, he introduced the Helping Save Americans’ Health Care Choices Act, to promote and expand the use of health savings accounts. Health savings accounts are a better alternative to third party payer systems, because they promote price transparency and competition among health care providers. When patients see where their money is going, they act to spend it more wisely, encouraging lower prices and better services across the sector.

Fleming’s bill raises the current contribution limits on Health Savings Accounts, allows spouses access to the accounts, expands the number of services covered by the accounts, and expands eligibility for the accounts. These type of reforms are essential to reduce the cost of actual health care, as distinct from tinkering with insurance markets as the Affordable Care Act and many competing proposals have tried to do.

Fleming has proved to be an uncompromising defender of freedom in other policy areas as well. Where many were tempted to accept minor reforms in large legislative packages this year, Fleming rejected the argument that we have to give up a lot to get a little. He opposed the USA Freedom Act, arguing that it did not go far enough in protecting Americans from domestic spying, despite heavy pressure from inside his own party.

Fleming took a similar stand on the Student Success Act, a reauthorization of No Child Left Behind that admittedly would make a number of positive reforms. But Fleming’s dedication to the Constitution, which provides no role for the federal government in education, led him to oppose the bill on principle, especially impressive given the Majority Whip’s personal commitment to the bill.

Fleming has also proved that he is not afraid to stand up to House leadership, being one of the Members who opposed the rule to advance trade legislation, earning the vocal ire of Speaker John Boehner. This was the same vote that almost cost Rep. Mark Meadows his subcommittee gavel.

For being a principled leader who continues to work tirelessly to reform the health care system and bring back constitutionalism to Congress, we’re proud to name John Fleming our Congressman of the Month!

Via: Freedom Works

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3 Historical Developments That Explain Our Current Religious Liberty Battles

In recent political memory, religious liberty was a value that brought together conservatives, libertarians, and progressives. As recently as 1993, the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act was passed by a nearly unanimous Congress and signed by a Democratic president. Today, the same value is a political liability. Bakers, photographers, and florists are being ruined, adoption agencies shuttered, schools threatened with loss of accreditation and nonprofit status. So what happened? Why is religious liberty now losing so much ground?

As I explain in my just-released book, Truth Overruled: The Future of Marriage and Religious Freedom, three historical developments explain our current predicament: a change in the scope of our government, a change in our sexual values, and a change in our political leaders’ vision of religious liberty. An adequate response will need to address each of these changes.

First, government has changed. The progressive movement gave us the administrative state. Limited government and the rule of law were replaced by the nearly unlimited reach of technocrats in governmental agencies. As government assumes responsibility for more areas of life, the likelihood of its infringing on religious liberty increases. Why should government be telling bakers and florists which weddings to serve in the first place? Why should it tell charities and religious schools how to operate and which values to teach? Only a swollen sense of unaccountable government authority can explain these changes.

Second, sexual values have changed. At the time of the American Revolution, religion and liberty were so closely linked that Thomas Jefferson could affirm, “The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time.” Meanwhile, his French contemporary Denis Diderot, expressing sentiments that would culminate in a very different revolution, declared that man “will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.” In our own time, however, the sexual revolution has shattered the American synthesis of faith and freedom, setting religion at odds with “liberty”—or more accurately, license. Now bakers, florists, adoption agencies, and schools that uphold what Americans have always believed about marriage find themselves at odds with the law.

Third, religious liberty has changed. Our Constitution protects the natural right to the free exercise of religion. But some liberals are trying to drastically narrow that right by redefining it as the mere “freedom of worship.” If they succeed, the robust religious freedom that made American civil society the envy of the world will be reduced to Sunday-morning piety confined within the four walls of a chapel. They have even gone so far as to rewrite the U.S. immigration exam to say that the First Amendment protects “freedom of worship” rather than the “free exercise of religion.”True religious liberty entails the freedom to live consistently with one’s beliefs seven days a week—in the chapel, in the marketplace, and in the public square.

These three changes represent a rejection of the American Founding. Progressive politics and a radical view of human sexuality are combining to coerce compliance at the expense of a bedrock human right. And of course much of this has been enabled by judicial activism, as in Obergefell.

S

o how do we fight against this onslaught? We start by fighting for courts to interpret and apply our laws fairly. Without a sound judiciary, no amount of public debate can ensure sound policy on issues like marriage and religious liberty, for the courts will always be able to refashion or discard what the people (through their representatives) have achieved. This is why the work of groups such as the Federalist Society, which opposes such judicial activism, is so important.

Outside the courtroom, our best strategy for fighting governmental overreach is to fight for more limited government. The less power government has, the less room there is for abuses of power. The alliance between social and economic conservatives is not just a marriage of convenience. They share important principles, and they face a common enemy—the expansion of government beyond its proper scope. This is why the work of an organization such as the Heritage Foundation, which opposes ever-expanding government, is so important.

Limited government and religious liberty are best served when human laws reflect the “laws of nature and of nature’s God,” as the Declaration of Independence puts it. All men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with a right to life. Mankind is created male and female, and marriage, by nature, is the union of man and woman. Only by redefining these concepts according to desire rather than nature is it possible to concoct a “right to choose” that extends even to the killing of an unborn child or an endlessly malleable concept of “marriage.”

Restoring a sound understanding of human nature and the laws of nature will be the work of the many organizations and groups—churches and synagogues, primary schools and universities, for example—that constitute civil society. Among these groups, public interest law firms such as the Alliance Defending Freedom have an important role. We need groups like this to push back on the sexual revolution and remind people of the law written on their hearts—a law that points the way to true, ordered liberty, not license, when it comes to human sexuality and the family.

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oth the Bible’s moral principles and reason require us to conform our desires to transcendent moral truths grounded in our nature as human beings, rational animals. The followers of postmodernism seek to re-create nature in accord with their desires, while the followers of progressivism use the power of government to make everyone else con- form to the desires of elites, who know best. These ideologies promote the satisfaction of desire even while trampling true natural rights and liberties like the free exercise of religion. And that’s where the work of groups like the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty proves so crucial. They insist against limiting religion to worship, and they defend its free exercise against encroachment in the name of untrammeled desire.

So the three steps that have undone core elements of the American Founding—progressive government and the administrative state, the sexual revolution’s elevation of desire, and the whittling of religious free exercise down to the freedom to worship—all need to be countered. Political organizations, religious and civic organizations, and legal organizations will have to play their roles in empowering the citizenry to reclaim their government and culture. I offer a roadmap for these groups to follow in Truth Overruled.

Without a return to the principles of the American Founding— ordered liberty based on faith and reason, natural rights and morality, limited government and civil society—Americans will continue to face serious and perplexing challenges. The dilemmas faced by bakers and florists and charities and schools are only the beginning.

Ryan T. Anderson is the William E. Simon Senior Research Fellow at The Heritage Foundation and author of the just-released book, Truth Overruled: The Future of Marriage and Religious Freedom, from which this essay is adapted. Follow him on Twitter @RyanTAnd.

Via: Daily Signal

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[VIDEO] National Right To Work President Mark Mix testifying at the U.S. House hearing “The NLRB’s Assault on Right To Work” (6/3/2015)

Help the National Right To Work Committee continue to share your voice with Congress and elected officials across the United States of America. Every contribution helps, please consider making a contribution now by clicking the “Donate to the National Right To Work Committee” button below.

Even if you do not feel like financially contributing today, you can help by signing up to become a Right To Work activist locally and nationally by clicking the “Become An Activist” button below. Then, you can use our tools to contact elected officials locally and in Washington, DC. These tools even make it simple for you to write Letters-to-the-Editor in many newspapers. We hope that you will take advantage of our activist tools.

Via: National Right to Work Committee

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]VIDEO] CHUCK SCHUMER TO DEFY OBAMA, OPPOSE IRAN DEAL

Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is expected to announce tomorrow that he opposes the nuclear accord President Obama negotiated with the Ayatollah’s regime in Iran. Schumer, as the third-ranking Democrat in the Senate, wields heavy influence over his caucus, whose representatives have been split over the deal thus far.

The New York Democratic Senator was often brought up in a recent New York City rally where over 12,000 people came to protest the Iran deal.

Schumer said in a statement regarding the Iran deal:

Advocates on both sides have strong cases for their point of view that cannot simply be dismissed. This has made evaluating the agreement a difficult and deliberate endeavor, and after deep study, careful thought and considerable soul-searching, I have decided I must oppose the agreement and will vote yes on a motion of disapproval.

“There are some who believe that I can force my colleagues to vote my way. While I will certainly share my view and try to persuade them that the vote to disapprove is the right one, in my experience with matters of conscience and great consequence like this, each member ultimately comes to their own conclusion,” he added.

The New York Times reports that Schumer retreated to his Brooklyn apartment on the Sunday that the deal was announced and had continuously studied the accord until making his decision this week. He ultimately determined that the deal was not one he could support.

Opponents of the Iran deal have said that the agreement allows for Iran to secure $150 billion dollars in unfrozen assets, which it could use to empower the terrorist regimes it supports as the world’s leading state-sponsor of jihadist terror groups. The deal also gives Iran at least 24-days notice before international inspectors are allowed to investigate whether the regime is cheating the deal, and if the Mullahs have decided to make a push towards developing nuclear weapons.

Via: Breitbart

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[VIDEO] 16 states ask Obama admin to put power plant rules on hold

WASHINGTON –  The campaign to stop President Barack Obama's sweeping emissions limits on power plants began taking shape Wednesday, as 16 states asked the government to put the rules on hold while a Senate panel moved to block them.

West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, who is leading the charge against the rules, banded together with 15 other state attorneys general in a letter to Environmental Protection Agency head Gina McCarthy requesting that the agency temporarily suspend the rules while they challenge their legality in court. The letter called for the EPA to respond by Friday.

The EPA and the White House both said they believe the limits are legal and have no plans to put them on hold. But by submitting the formal request anyway, the attorneys general are laying the groundwork to ask the courts to suspend the emissions limits instead.

"These regulations, if allowed to proceed, will do serious harm to West Virginia and the U.S. economy," Morrisey said. "That is why we are taking quick action to bring this process to a halt."

The 16 states and a handful of others are preparing to sue the Obama administration to block the rules permanently by arguing they exceed Obama's authority. Bolstered by a recent Supreme Court ruling against the administration's mercury limits, opponents argued that states shouldn't have to start preparing to comply with a rule that may eventually get thrown out by the courts.

The speedy opposition from the states came two days after Obama unveiled the final version of the rules, which mark the first time the U.S. has ever limited carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants. Obama's revised plan mandates a 32 percent cut in emissions nationwide by 2030, compared to 2005 levels — a steeper cut than in his earlier proposal.

Most of the attorneys general signing the letter Wednesday are Republicans. Yet they were joined by Jack Conway of the coal-producing state of Kentucky. Conway and Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear are both Democrats, but have joined the state's Republican leaders in denouncing Obama's power plant limits, which form the centerpiece of his plan to fight climate change.

Although the most serious threat to Obama's power plant rules is in the courts, lawmakers in Congress are also pursuing legislative means to stop them. The first vote came Wednesday in the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, where a bill blocking the rules passed the GOP-controlled panel by a voice vote — but not without a bit of drama.

Over the protests of boycotting Democrats, the Senate GOP-controlled panel approved legislation designed to block the Obama administration from implementing the tough new standards.

Democrats walked out of the committee meeting in protest of a separate bill about pesticides, arguing it should have been the subject of a fact-finding hearing. Lacking the necessary quorum for a vote, Republican Chairman Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma reconvened the meeting in a lunchroom just off the Senate floor, where the aroma of a just-completed GOP lunch was still wafting in the air.

The voice vote approving the bill sends it to the full Senate, where a filibuster battle awaits. Obama has vowed to veto any such legislation, and Republicans have yet to prove they can muster the votes to override his veto.

Via: Fox News

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