GOP advances plan to block health law funding

Under the House Republicans' plan, language to block money for the overhaul implementation would be attached as an amendment to a stop-gap spending bill necessary to finance the federal government for the rest of the year.

The Wall Street Journal: GOP Seeks To Block Funding For Health Law
House Republicans will use a stopgap spending bill coming to the floor next week as a vehicle to block money for the new health care law, a top lawmaker said Tuesday. The latest push to neutralize the legislation, confirmed by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, (R., Va.), comes on the heels of an earlier effort to repeal the law. That passed the House but fell short in the Senate (Hook, 2/9).

Politico: Eric Cantor: GOP Will Defund Health Care Law
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor says the bill to fund the government for the rest of the year will have language to withhold funding from the health care law by the time it passes the House next week. It was a message to the party's conservative base that, no, Republicans haven't forgotten about defunding the health care law. But Cantor still didn't promise that the defunding language would be in the bill from the beginning — as tea partiers and other opponents of the law want (Nather, 2/8).

Fox News: Republicans Plan To Choke Off Funding For Health Care Law
There's an old saying in Washington that the policy follows the money. In other words, if there's no money for something, the policy won't go very far. Such could be the case for the health care reform law Congress approved last year. Health care reform may be the law of the land. But it won't mean much if the funding stream dries up. And that's exactly what House Republicans intend to do next week when they bring a measure to the floor to run the government from March through the end of September (Pergram, 2/8).

The Hill: GOP Plans Vote To Defund Health Care
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor says he expects an amendment to eliminate funding will be offered next week. A House bill funding the federal government through the rest of the year will not include money to implement health care reform, the chamber's second-ranking Republican said Tuesday. The original version of the legislation won't include defunding language, but House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said he expects an amendment will take care of that by the time the House votes on a bill next week (Millman, 2/8).

Bloomberg: Republican Cantor Says U.S. House to Bar Funding For Obama Health Care Law
U.S. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said a spending measure needed to continue financing government operations this fiscal year will also prohibit money to implement the health care law. Cantor, a Virginia Republican, said yesterday the spending measure will include a provision that would "preclude any funds to be used for" the overhaul of the U.S. health care system that was enacted last year. Congress must pass legislation to continue financing the government by March 4, when a temporary funding measure expires, or risk a shutdown of offices and services (Rowley, 2/9).

National Journal: Efforts To Defund Reform Law Coming In Amendments
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., confirmed on Tuesday that Republicans intend to use the upcoming fiscal 2011 continuing resolution to ban discretionary money from being used to implement the health care reform law, but that the effort is likely to come in the form of individual Republican amendments. The shift toward offering a "clean" continuing resolution to reduce spending without directly wading into repealing the health care law could signal House Republican leadership is trying to move away from political battles over the health care law (McCarthy, 2/8).