GOP repeal plans move ahead in House and Senate; Support to undo 1099 reporting provision gains momentum

In the House, Republicans begin their committee-level efforts to dismantle the health law today. Meanwhile, GOP senators continue to push for a repeal vote in the upper chamber.

Politico: House GOP Launches Repeal Plan
On Wednesday, Republicans begin the potentially risky strategy of dismantling the health care reform law piece by piece. Two House committees will start their dissection of the law, examining its cost and its impact on the economy. Republicans in both chambers also plan to introduce dozens of bills this week aimed at rolling back various parts of the reform law. But a new poll suggests that the strategy might not go over well with the public, even though opposition to the health care reform law is at a record high (Haberkorn, 1/26).

Politico: Mitch McConnell: We'll Have A Repeal Vote
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell wielded a procedural rule in a way that sounded a lot like a dare, just hours before the State of the Union speech. McConnell invoked Rule 14 to try to bring a health care repeal bill on the Senate calendar without going through committees first. In theory, it could force a vote on the repeal bill passed in the House last week as early as Thursday. It won't — Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada sets the floor schedule, and Democrats can object to bringing it up (Nather, 1/25).

Fox News: McConnell Moves To Bring Health Care Repeal To Senate
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday night, just hours before the president's State of the Union address, began the legislative process of forcing the House-passed health care repeal bill to the Senate floor for a vote. Using a particular Senate rule typically reserved for the leaders, McConnell bypassed committee action and put the bill directly before the members, even without the support of the Majority Leader who, for the most part, controls the legislative calendar. It is a procedure that takes a couple of days to ripen before any vote can occur, though even then it could be a fight (Turner, 1/25).

McClatchy: S.C. Sen. DeMint Aims To Repeal 'ObamaCare'
Sen. Jim DeMint planned to introduce a bill (Wednesday) that he said will serve as the main Senate Republican legislative vehicle for repealing Barack Obama's signature health care law. DeMint, a Greenville, S.C., Republican elected to his second term in November, said 31 of the Senate's 47 GOP members had signed on as cosponsors of his measure, and that he expected more to add their names (Rosen, 1/26).

Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., introduced legislation Jan. 25 to repeal the health law's 1099 reporting provision.

Modern Healthcare: Reid, Baucus Move To Repeal 1099 Provision
The two Democratic leaders in the Senate most responsible for enactment of the healthcare reform law last year are now pushing for a change in the law, even as they fight off Republican efforts to make other changes or repeal the entire measure. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Max Baucus (D-Mont.), chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, introduced legislation Tuesday that would repeal the healthcare law's requirement for businesses to report every vendor payment valued at $600 or more to the IRS using Tax Form 1099 (Daly, 1/25).

CQ Healthbeat: Support Grows In Senate For Repeal Of Health Care Law's Tax-Reporting Provision
Competing bills to repeal the unpopular tax-reporting requirement in the health care law were introduced in the Senate on Wednesday, giving hope to supporters who want to strike the provision early this year and pressuring the House to move on similar legislation. One of the bills, introduced by Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., has bipartisan support along with offsets; the second, introduced by Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has no offsets, but does have the support of leaders who control what bills come to the floor (Ethridge, 1/25).