White House, reform supporters play defense before Senate vote

The White House and liberal groups are pushing back Wednesday morning against Senate Republicans before an expected vote on repealing the healthcare reform law in the upper chamber.

Reform law supporters find themselves in something of an unexpected position of playing defense in the Senate. The House, on a party-line vote two weeks ago, repealed the reform law, but the measure wasn’t expected to see the light of day in the Senate, where Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) controls the action.

But on Tuesday, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) announced he and Reid reached an agreement to allow a vote on repeal as an amendment to an aviation bill. Now the White House and pro-reform Health Care for America Now (HCAN) are trying to hammer home the importance of the popular consumer protections included in the reform law.

“It’s important to remember what repealing the Affordable Care Act would mean to millions of Americans,” wrote Stephanie Cutter, deputy senior adviser to President Obama, in a blog post Wednesday morning.

HCAN executive director Ethan Rome said, “Senate Republicans should personally explain to their constituents why their political games will take away a law that ends the worst insurance company abuses and liberates families, seniors and businesses from crushing healthcare costs and devastating denials of care."

The Senate is expected to take up a vote on the repeal measure sometime Wednesday, as well as a vote on eliminating an unpopular IRS filing requirement.

On Tuesday, a coalition of more than 250 trade associations, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, wrote an open letter asking all senators to support repeal.

“The sooner [the law] is repealed, the sooner Congress, the administration and all stakeholders can start over with a bipartisan and transparent process aimed at consensus, and get healthcare reform right,” the letter read.