Health law emerges as biggest issue in Georgia’s GOP Senate race

Democrats

A stethoscope-wearing U.S. Rep. Phil Gingrey informs television viewers he won’t run for a second term unless he can repeal the new health care law.

Former Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel tells radio listeners the members of Congress she’s running against are getting special “Obamacare” deals.

U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston asks Facebook surfers to click his ad if they want to repeal the law.

Georgia’s major Republican candidates for U.S. Senate share functionally the same view of the Affordable Care Act: They want to get rid of it and they backed the strategy to strip funding for it in any spending bill, a standoff that led to a government shutdown last month.

But their efforts to communicate those views — and outdo each other in their aggression toward the law — show its potency as the No. 1 political issue across the country.

“Obamacare is the top issue on everyone’s mind — Republican and Democrat alike — and finding some real solutions to this mess is going to be one of the most important jobs that whoever gets elected to the Senate will have,” said Virginia Galloway, a conservative activist who now heads the Georgia branch of Americans for Prosperity but is joining Ralph Reed’s Faith and Freedom Coalition next year.

Still, Galloway said no one in the crowded Republican primary field to replace U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss has come up with a real alternative yet.

“I think you need to put some meat on those bones,” said Galloway, who has not backed a candidate.

Of the group, U.S. Rep. Paul Broun, an Athens Republican, is the only one who has written a health care overhaul of his own, which he first introduced before the 2010 Affordable Care Act became law. He would toss out the new law, change Medicare into a voucher-type system, and turn Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program into block grant programs run by the states.

Broun’s bill would tackle the individual insurance market by making all health care expenses tax-deductible and allowing people to buy insurance plans across state lines, among other changes.

The bill is backed by the tea party-allied group FreedomWorks, but it has no co-sponsors and is unlikely to get anywhere in the House.

Last week, Broun voted against a House Republican plan to allow people on the individual insurance market to keep existing health plans that did not meet standards set by the Affordable Care Act. He said the legislation did not go far enough and repeal the health care law.

The other two Georgia House Republicans running for the Senate — Gingrey of Marietta and Kingston of Savannah — voted for the bill, as Broun was one of only four Republicans to oppose it.

Gingrey made a splash last week by launching the first television ads of the campaign in which he pledges not to run for a second Senate term unless the law is repealed.

“That is definitely taking it a step further than anyone else,” said Justin Tomczak, a Cobb County Republican strategist who is working on Gingrey’s behalf. “This is a measure of accountability.”

All the candidates have said they would vote to repeal the law. To actually accomplish that would require Republicans to take over the Senate and the White House, or a shocking reversal by Democrats.

“Gingrey is trying to take advantage of that general feeling among all Republicans by being the boldest and loudest, but that’s because he hasn’t really occupied a space up until this point and is trying to create a niche for himself,” said Robert Lee, a Cobb County GOP consultant who supports Handel.

In the House, Gingrey has been one of the most prominent voices in favor of stripping federal employee health insurance subsidies for members of Congress and staff. In a special provision under the law, they all must lose their current coverage and join the state-based health insurance exchanges, but the Obama administration ruled they could keep their employer subsidy.

When Gingrey made the case in a closed-door House GOP meeting, an attendee leaked to the press Gingrey's remark that staffers should lose the subsidy because they will soon become high-paid lobbyists while he's "stuck here making $172,000."

The comment sparked an outcry, but Gingrey fought back by saying he was being attacked for his insistence that members and staff be treated the same as other people on the exchanges who don’t have employer-provided insurance.

Handel, of Roswell, already had raised the issue in the Senate campaign. She aired radio ads in the hometowns of her three U.S. House foes saying they will benefit from "special treatment," and she's made the issue a linchpin of an anti-Washington campaign.

David Perdue, the former CEO of Dollar General who now lives in Glynn County, talks often on the campaign trail about a letter addressed to his wife from Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia saying that the Perdues will not be able to renew their health insurance plan because of the Affordable Care Act.

Millions of Americans who get insurance in the individual market are getting similar letters, as the law mandates new coverage requirements. President Barack Obama last week announced an administrative fix allowing insurers to keep selling current plans to existing customers, but it's unclear how many insurers will continue to do so.

Perdue’s cancellation letter adds a personal twist to his opposition to the law, as he, too, attempts an outsider, anti-Washington campaign.

Perdue also joined Broun, Gingrey, Handel and Kingston in publicly backing the strategy pushed by U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, to strip funding for the law as part of any government spending bill, an effort that led to a government shutdown and ultimately did not succeed.

The unanimity was cited by Democrats who are rooting for a race to the hard right in a GOP primary that could open the door for an upset win by their likely candidate, Michelle Nunn, the nonprofit CEO who is a heavy favorite in the Democratic primary.

But while the shutdown took its toll on Republicans, the past month's stumbles for Obamacare — including the cancellation notices and a nonfunctioning website — have damaged Democrats. Nunn has said she does not want to repeal the law but wants to delay the requirement that all individuals buy health insurance by a year.