By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist
Conservative lawmakers are fuming over the discovery of $105 billion that was hidden in ObamaCare that will enable the unpopular law to be funded in spite of any plans to defund it.
FoxNews.com is reporting that Rep. Michele Bachman (R-MN) says the money was hidden in the bill in order to make its funding automatic and not subject to annual spending votes by Congress.
“This is a crime against democracy,” Bachmann said. “This is a bombshell.”
She is demanding that the money be returned and is threatening to include language requiring return of the money in the next short-term budget bill, a “must pass” piece of legislation that will enable the government to continue operating beyond March 18.
“You didn’t tell the American people, you didn’t tell the Senate, you didn’t tell the House, give the money back,” Bachmann told Fox’s Sean Hannity on Monday night. “And then, we’ll start talking about the budget . . . ”
It’s unclear if she can garner enough backing to use the short-term budget bill as a way to get the money removed.
Bachmann is not the first person to question the hidden billions. The money was the subject of a study by Heritage Foundation fellow and former congressman Ernest Istook in late January.
Istook called the inclusion of the money a “major foul” on Democrats’ part and accused the bill’s authors of bypassing the normal appropriations process to block any future Congress from meddling with the money.
“Making years’ worth of spending decisions in advance is an attempt to handcuff the current Congress and prevent it from determining current levels of spending,” he wrote.
Among other provisions, about $40 billion would go to the Children’s Health Insurance Program, $15 billion would go to a prevention and public health fund, $10 billion would go to Medicare and Medicaid innovation programs, and $9.5 billion would go to the Community Health Centers Fund which will dole out money to organizations such as Planned Parenthood.
Another $16 billion would be given to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius as a kind of “slush fund” that would allow her to use the money at her own discretion.
Democrats do not deny that they buried the money in the bill, but say it was part of the original “score” by the Congressional Budget Office that was presented to Congress.
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