“This bill would defund an Obamacare political slush fund controlled by HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and instead use the money to give the sickest Americans health insurance. ATR is supportive of this legislation… H.R. 1549 would take four years of funding from Obamacare’s “Prevention and Public Health Fund" and re-deploy the money to a high risk pool. This slush fund has turned into a political grab bag of patronage and bribery in its short life. So far, taxpayer dollars have been used for pet neutering campaigns, bike/park signs, gardening, fast food construction moratorium lobbying, polling to test messaging for higher soda taxes, as well as working with the Centers for Disease Control to lobby for higher “sin" taxes across the board. … Next week, Members of the U.S. House will have a simple choice: do you think money is better spent on lobbyists and PR firms, or is it better spent on sick people? - Americans for Tax Reform, April 19, 2013
“Enactment of the cleverly drafted bill would help impede the implementation of ObamaCare…H.R.1549 should be viewed as a tactical maneuver in a larger war, cannibalizing the implementation of ObamaCare exchanges in order to gain leverage in the larger fight for health care freedom." - Dean Clancy, FreedomWorks, April 18, 2013
“The Helping Sick Americans Now Act would simply force Obama and Sebelius to do what they should have already done: transfer funds from the Prevention Fund to PCIP. Instead of sending out grants to left-wing activists to raise our taxes and restrict our freedoms, we could help 40,000 sick Americans with pre-existing conditions get access to insurance." - Phil Kerpen, American Commitment, April 18, 2013
“The House Energy and Commerce committee has been unrelenting investigating ObamaCare lies, spending and political tricks. This week they voted to end an ObamaCare slush fund that has been funding liberal local groups to lobby for higher taxes and all other manner of illegally funded lobby activities. Now HHS is also raiding it to set up exchanges after these monies were eliminated in the debt ceiling deal. The newest legislation would take the all money left, reduce the deficit by a billion dollars and help those with pre-existing conditions who can’t find insurance. HR 1549 would end the slush fund, actually help people and cut the deficit. Every committee Democrat voted against it, of course." - Repeal It Now, April 19, 2013
“The Helping Sick Americans Now Act (H.R. 1549) is a win-win for conservatives. Providing insurance to people with pre-existing conditions was a key motivator for passage of ObamaCare in the first place. The House leadership is correct in proposing legislation to continue this coverage." - Grace Marie Turner, President, Galen Institute, April 18, 2013
“It allows Republicans to make the case for high-risk pools (especially for their approach to such pools-as embodied in the House Republican alternative to Obamacare from 2010 and essentially every other conservative health-care proposal in the past half decade), it allows them to highlight another element of Obamacare’s failed design, and it allows them to force the Democrats to choose between funding advertising for their coming train wreck of a health reform or supporting ongoing access to coverage for actual sick Americans. … The bill is a small but meaningful example of how it might be possible to simultaneously remove some elements of Obamacare while highlighting conservative alternatives in the period until conservatives have a chance to finally rid the nation of this travesty of health reform and put in place a genuine market-based approach." - Yuval Levin, National Review, April, 19, 2013
