Some Cuban-American groups have begun to ask for a congressional probe of Cuba's potential ties to Medicare fraud.

Shortly after the Senate passed a two-week stopgap measure to keep the government running, anti-abortion advocates re-energized their fight against Planned Parenthood.

The continuing resolution (CR) sent to President Obama Wednesday morning, designed to give Democratic and Republican lawmakers more time to hammer out a longer-term spending bill, avoided the most controversial aspects of a seven-month measure House Republicans approved two weeks ago. That spending bill included language from Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) that would block federal funds from Planned Parenthood, as well as several other provisions that would prevent funding for the new healthcare reform law.

The two-week CR was seen a necessary stopgap because the Democratic-controlled Senate was unwilling to approve those provisions, as well as larger spending cuts in the House bill.

Americans United for Life Action (AULA) on Thursday quickly challenged the Senate to include Planned Parenthood defunding language in the next longer-term CR.

“The onus is now on the Senate to ensure that Americans are no longer forced to fund the nation’s largest abortion provider with their tax dollars,” said AULA President Charmaine Yoest in a statement. “The Government ought to spend its time and our money funding things that matter to the American people — not subsidizing the abortion industry and funding corrupt organizations like Planned Parenthood.”

A handful of Senate Democrats have offered prominent support for Planned Parenthood in the past few weeks, as Republicans in the lower chamber have backed Planned Parenthood defunding and other legislation limiting abortion services.

House Republicans are accusing President Obama of "playing politics" by opposing their plan to pay for the repeal of an unpopular IRS reporting requirement in the healthcare reform law by tapping into the law’s insurance subsidies.

The House is set to debate a bill Wednesday that would offset the cost of healthcare reform’s 1099 requirement by recapturing a greater amount of improper overpayments of insurance exchange subsidies established by the law. 

The White House denounced the plan Tuesday night, accusing it of creating a tax increase for middle-class families.

"[The bill] would result in tax increases on certain middle-class families that incur unexpected tax liabilities, in many cases totaling thousands of dollars, notwithstanding that they followed the rules," the administration said.

However, Republicans on the panel that developed the 1099 repeal pay-for say they are restoring the law’s subsidy penalties to their original form after Congress changed the recapture formula in December to fund a one-year patch staving off scheduled reimbursement cuts to Medicare physicians.

"If the Obama administration and the Democrats are going to let those who are ineligible for taxpayer-funded subsidies pocket taxpayer dollars anyway, then they’ve got some explaining to do to the American people," a spokesperson for Ways and Means Committee Republicans told The Hill.

"It is hypocritical for Democrats to oppose provisions they previously supported," the spokesperson continued. "If they were interested in eliminating the 1099 policy instead of playing politics, then why wouldn’t they support this bill?"

President Obama’s health department has paid out more than a half-billion dollars in health benefits to a temporary early retiree insurance program included in the healthcare reform law, the department announced Wednesday morning.

As of Dec. 31, 2010, almost 5,500 employers covering 61,000 people had been accepted into the Early Retiree Reinsurance Program (ERRP), which reimburses plan sponsors for part of health insurance costs for early retirees – typically people between 55 and 65 – and their families. 

The Department of Health and Human Services says the program is essential because individuals in that age range typically have trouble obtaining insurance in the individual market. The program reimburses enrollees at an equivalent of 80 percent of the actual costs of health expenses between $15,000 and $90,000.

The majority of the ERRP sponsors represent state and local government employees (47 percent), followed by employees of commercial (27.5 percent), nonprofit (15.1 percent), union (10 percent) and religious (0.4 percent) organizations.

A small number of Republicans voted against the two-week continuing resolution (CR) on Tuesday night as a way to protest the bill's funding of last year's healthcare law, and the absence of larger cuts.

Six Republicans ended up rejecting the bill: Reps. Justin Amash (Mich.), Michele Bachmann (Minn.), Louie Gohmert (Texas), Walter Jones (N.C), Steve King (Iowa), and Ron Paul (Texas). Bachmannn said her vote against the GOP bill was over healthcare.

"I agree with the need to cut spending, but I voted against the two-week CR today because it did not include language to defund ObamaCare," Bachmann said. "Over the coming years, ObamaCare will hurt our economy so defunding it must remain part of our negotiations on a CR."

The Obama administration expressed strong support for repealing the 1099 reporting provision included in the healthcare law but is concerned about how the cost of the measure is offset in House and Senate legislation. 

"The administration strongly opposes the House’s offset to pay for this repeal, which would undo an improvement enacted with nearly unanimous support in the Medicare and Medicaid Extenders Act that eliminated an egregious "cliff" in the tax system affecting middle income taxpayers," according to Statement of Administration Policy released Tuesday night.

The House's Republican-proposed offset would recapture improper overpayments of exchange subsidies established under the new healthcare law for those consumers earning more than to 400 percent of the poverty line. Those making less than that would have to pay back a greater portion than they are required to pay back under current law when health insurance exchanges open in 2014.

Medicaid continues to dominate the health policy agenda this week as the Obama administration weighs how much flexibility to give states, and federal officials prepare to testify about the fraud and abuse in federal health programs.

Governors warn Congress of healthcare reform law's costs: Republican governors ripped into Democrats' healthcare reform law on Tuesday, testifying before Congress that the law's massive Medicaid expansion and other federal mandates will hurt their states. The governors were in town for this weekend's winter meeting of the National Governors Association.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and Utah's Gary Herbert told the Energy and Commerce Committee that states were left out of the debate on Capitol Hill over the past couple of years. They also told the sympathetic Republican-led panel that they need much more flexibility to run their own healthcare programs. Read the Healthwatch report.

Dueling reports on health law's costs issued as governors testify on Capitol Hill: Dueling reports on the healthcare reform law's impact on states surfaced Tuesday as governors testified on Capitol Hill.

A new bicameral report from Republicans on the Senate Finance and House Energy and Commerce panels estimated that the law's Medicaid expansion would cost $118 billion over 10 years, almost twice the Congressional Budget Office's score. Simultaneously, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation issued a report saying states would get $82.3 billion from the federal government in Medicaid and state exchange subsidies. Healthwatch's Julian Pecquet has the run-down.

The White House wants a say, too: WH spokesman Jay Carney also addressed Medicaid at Tuesday's briefing.

"We are committed to working with governors to help them manage their Medicaid costs, their Medicaid programs, and the Department of Health and Human Services has been an active and constructive partner with the states, with the governors, to answer their questions and ensure they are aware of the substantial flexibility that exists in the Affordable Care Act," Carney told reporters. "It’s important to remember that the Affordable Care Act will cover the overwhelming majority of the costs associated with the Medicaid expansion and will, in fact, reduce the amounts they spend to care for the uninsured. A lot of independent experts have actually estimated that the states will have a net savings in their Medicare program because of the Affordable Care Act."

Ryan knocks Obama for not shoring up Medicare funding: The Obama administration is violating federal law by declining to submit a proposal to shore up the Medicare program, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) charged Tuesday. Federal officials retort that the law doesn't legally bind them to do anything. Healthwatch's Julian Pecquet has the story.

The House Budget Committee's chairman said the administration is violating the law by not proposing ways to shore up Medicare.

Republican governors ripped into Democrats' healthcare reform law on Tuesday, testifying before Congress that the law's massive Medicaid expansion and other federal mandates will hurt their states.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and Utah's Gary Herbert told the Energy and Commerce Committee that states were left out of the debate on Capitol Hill over the past couple of years. They also told the sympathetic Republican-led panel that they need much more flexibility to run their own healthcare programs.

"We shouldn't have to come here and kowtow and kiss the ring" of federal officials to get the needed flexibility to run Medicaid, said Barbour, a potential 2012 presidential candidate.

"Believe it or not," Barbour told lawmakers, "we love our constituents as much as you all do. And we want to do right for them. But we want to do what we can afford and can sustain."

Governors made that case repeatedly over the weekend, during their winter meeting of the National Governors Association. President Obama told them Monday that he'd heard their message and wants to work with them to reform Medicaid and find alternative ways to achieve near-universal healthcare coverage.