The new agenda for House Republicans is drawing national attention, after they are pushing legislation introduced Wednesday in an attempt to defund Obamacare. Using the upcoming budget deadline, John Boehner, R-Ohio, is one that is leading this effort, taking one more stab to do away with President Barack Obama’s health care reform law.
“We’re going to continue to do everything we can to repeal the president’s failed healthcare law,” Boehner told reporters on Capitol Hill. He stated the House will pass a resolution “that locks the sequester savings in and defunds Obamacare.”
This agenda is to appease conservatives who vowed to force a government shutdown unless Obamacare was defunded, but is destined to die in the Democratic Senate. This feud to fund the government between House Republicans, Senate Democrats and Obama has the potential for a government shut down, with the September 30 deadline approaching.
“There should be no conversation about shutting the government down,” Boehner said. “That’s not the goal here.”
House Majority Leader, Eric Cantor, R-Va., said Wednesday that Republicans would move to delay Obamacare for a year, which is a seemingly simple offer, to negotiate for a raising the debt limit in order to avoid government shut down at the end of September.
“In the coming week we will unveil a plan to extend our nation’s ability to borrow, while delaying Obamacare and protecting working, middle-class families from its horrific effects,” Cantor said.
Despite more than 40 attempts to vote to repeal the 2010 law, Republicans are live up to their vows to “repeal and replace” the existing law, using any means necessary.
“You have never seen in the history of the United States the debt ceiling or the threat of not raising the debt ceiling being used to extort a president or a governing party,” Obama told the group of business leaders. He said such a precedent would “fundamentally change how American government functions.”