Obamacare deadline extended by White House even after claiming ‘no legal authority’ to do so (Tea Party) - Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius just told Congress days ago there would be no extension of the Obamacare enrollment deadline. But once again, the Obama administration extended the deadline, giving two more weeks to those who start the enrollment process by the end of the month. “This is really one of the most audacious changes so far because several committees in Congress have been looking at all these delays and all these changes. Secretary Sebelius was asked point blank, ‘Will you extend the deadline past the March 31 enrollment date?’ And she said, ‘No, we will not,’” said Grace-Marie Turner, president of the Galen Institute. “In a separate hearing she said, ‘We don’t believe we have legal authority to do that.’ But that’s what they’ve done anyway. So they’re basically going before Congress that people have until March 31. Clearly, they’re not getting the enrollment they wanted. Therefore, they’re going to ask people, ‘Well, did you try to enroll? Did you have any trouble? If so, then we’ll extend the deadline for you. Rules mean nothing to this administration,” said Turner. The Obama administration initially said that seven million sign-ups were needed. Since then the administration has lowered the target goal to six million, claiming now that more than five million have signed up. However, no one—not Sebelius or any other administration official—will confirm the number of Americans who have actually paid their premiums for the first month. Sebelius is claiming not to know because private insurance firms have that data. Turner isn’t buying into the claim. “I don’t believe that she doesn’t know. She hides behind the fact that they don’t have any way of knowing that. Part of it is because the website is still not built, as far as being able to allow people to pay. But I think if they knew and that were a big number, we would hear about it,” explained Turner. She also revealed that House Republicans are going directly to the insurance companies in order to determine the number of enrollees that have actually paid their premiums. When asked whether a short-term extension of the enrollment deadline will give the Obama administration enough time to attract enough people to meet the target, Turner said: “I don’t think it’s going to make that big of a difference because most of the people who are uninsured, which is the whole reason we passed this all, are saying, ‘I don’t want this insurance. It’s too expensive, high deductibles, it’s too much of a hassle.’ So they’re not going to be insured, and I think that’s going to be a big problem for them,” Turner said . She also added that the administration is refusing to disclose the number of first-time enrollees and the number of people enrolling due to the fact that they lost their existing coverage due to Obamacare. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid preposterously suggested that many people are failing to sign up because they are not Internet savvy. “There are some people who are not like my grandchildren who can handle everything so easily on the Internet, and these people need a little extra time,” said Reid. “We have a lot of people just like this through no fault of the Internet, but because people are not educated on how to use the Internet.” As Turner said, “That’s not quite as bad as calling the American people liars when they say that they’ve been harmed by Obamacare, but it shows how completely out of touch Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is with the real world and what real people are dealing with in trying to figure out how to deal with these exchanges.” Turner pointed out that people have multiple other avenues by which they could sign up instead of going through Healthcare.gov but Americans just don’t like Obamacare. - See more at: teaparty.org/rules-mean-nothing-obama-administration-37808/#sthash.zLXSPuRX.dpuf
Posted on: Sat, 29 Mar 2014 13:29:30 +0000
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