A freshman GOP member who did not campaign against the healthcare reform law voiced strong support for the repeal bill Wednesday afternoon.

“Americans wanted healthcare reform for some time now, but they don’t want what passed last spring,” said Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) on the House floor Wednesday afternoon.

“Today’s repeal is the first step,” he continued. “Tomorrow, we begin the process of replacement with commonsense market-based solutions.”

According to local press, during last year's campaign, Duffy explicitly did not push for repeal and even touted some of the reform law's benefits.

Repealing the Democrats' healthcare reform law would take away "ground-breaking steps" to expand access to care and prevention of mental illness and substance abuse," the nonprofit group Mental Health America said in a statement Wednesday.

Mental health has taken on added political significance since Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and 18 others were shot on Jan. 8. The suspect in the case, Jared Lee Loughner, is widely believed to suffer from a mental illness.

Mental Health America praised the law, which requires individual plans sold through state health insurance exchanges to cover mental healthcare starting in 2014 and gets millions of uninsured Americans into the Medicaid program. The law also requires plans to allow young people up to the age of 26 to stay on their parents' family plans and provides additional funding for school-based health clinics.

"These provisions are critical in light of the fact that half of all people with a mental health diagnosis first experience it by age 14, but will not receive treatment until many years later, if at all," Mental Health America President and CEO David Shern said in the statement. "It also places a high priority on prevention by covering preventive services and programs to support community-based prevention activities."

Democrats have criticized Republicans for moving to repeal the reform law without replacing some of its more popular consumer protections.

A majority of registered Independent voters support the GOP’s effort to repeal and replace the healthcare reform law, according to a new survey from a Republican pollster.

Fifty-four percent of Independents support the plan to repeal and replace the law, while 36 percent oppose the effort, according to a new poll from Resurgent Republic, which is headed Ed Gillespie, former chairman of the Republican National Committee and counselor to President George W. Bush.

Independents, considered a key political demographic, have consistently supported repeal and replace since the mid-term elections swept Republicans into power in the House of Representatives, the poll said.

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) posted the poll results on his Twitter feed Wedesday morning.

The House will resume debate on the repeal bill Wednesday morning before taking up a vote by the evening. The House will vote on a resolution Thursday that instructs committees to consider pieces to replace the reform law.

However, the debate will have little affect on 50 percent of registered voters, who say their opinions on healthcare reform are firm, according to the poll.

Medicare’s chief actuary says he won’t hesitate to correct anyone who twists his analysis of the controversial healthcare law.

President Obama said Tuesday evening that the American people "have greater health security than they did a year ago" thanks to the healthcare reform law that House Republicans plan to repeal Wednesday. 

Following a day of claims and counter-claims about the law's benefits and costs, Obama said he was "willing and eager" to work with both parties to "improve" his signature domestic achievement.

"But we can’t go backward," Obama said. "Americans deserve the freedom and security of knowing that insurance companies can’t deny, cap or drop their coverage when they need it the most, while taking meaningful steps to curb runaway healthcare costs.”

The White House has already warned that it would veto repeal legislation in the highly unlikely event that it clears the Senate.

The complete text of the president's statement is below:

Welcome to The Hill's evening roundup of the day's health policy news and advance look at tomorrow's schedule.

Tuesday's health news: 

Both parties and their supporters deluged the Internet with arguments, anecdotes and reports for and against the healthcare reform law as debate began prior to Wednesday's vote. 

The Department of Health and Human Services got off to an early start with a new report arguing that up to 129 million Americans could have a pre-existing condition and stand to lose if the law's repealed. http://bit.ly/gS6O8H

Democrats also argued that Republicans should have a lengthy debate about the law's merits because many of their freshmen don't know the law's benefits. http://bit.ly/hrxLjw

Republicans shot back with a letter signed by letter by 200 economists and other experts, including two former CBO and three former OMB directors, urging repeal because of the law's cost to the economy. http://bit.ly/ePEesT

Read more...

Florida is asking a federal judge in Florida to allow six more states — all with newly empowered Republican governors — to join a lawsuit challenging the healthcare reform law.

If accepted, the request to add Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Wisconsin and Wyoming would bring the number of states on the lawsuit to 26.

U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson, appointed by President Reagan, may rule as soon as this week on whether the reform law’s requirement for individuals to purchase health insurance is unconstitutional.

Florida’s new attorney general, Pamela Jo Bondi (R), said adding the states to the lawsuit, which also was filed by the National Federation of Independent Business, would not delay a decision.

“The only effect of granting this motion would be to expand from 20 to 26 the number of Plaintiff States joining together to seek both a declaration that the [reform law] is unconstitutional and injunctive relief for the benefit of themselves and their citizens and residents,” she wrote in the request, filed Tuesday. “Thus, the requested relief will not result in any detriment to Defendants in defending this action; and the Additional States, after being permitted to be named as Plaintiffs, will be in a position to benefit from any equitable remedies that may be entered in this cause.”

Two federal judges, both appointed by President Clinton, last year upheld the so-called individual mandate. However, a federal judge in Virginia — a President George W. Bush appointee — in December struck down the individual mandate, though he declined to block the law’s implementation.

Opponents of the reform law say the Constitution bans Congress from regulating “inactivity,” which in this case would be an individual’s decision not to purchase healthcare. However, the administration argues that everyone participates in the healthcare system, and failure to purchase coverage is an active choice affecting the insurance market.

The Florida case also challenges the reform law’s expansion of states’ Medicaid programs.

Oklahoma's incoming attorney general said earlier this month that the state would file its own lawsuit challenging the reform law.

Seniors who received $250 checks for prescription drug costs under the Democrats' law would not have to repay the money.