Nullification

Health Care Nullification Bill Moving Through Idaho Legislature

Eric Kleefeld | February 4, 2011, 3:36PM

Another battle over attempts by Republican state legislators to nullify the federal health care reform law is bubbling up in deep-red Idaho, where legislation was introduced last week.

As the Spokane Spokesman-Review (located just on the other side of the Washington state border) reports, legislators in a key Idaho state House committee voted to advance the bill on a party-line vote, 15 Republicans for four Democrats. However, some GOP legislators said at the same time that they had reservations about the bill, and were voting for the bill in committee in order to allow for further debate.

The bill's main sponsor, state Rep. Vito Barbieri (R) said: "The question becomes, is the Legislature going to become a rubber stamp of everything that the government decides to do, or is the Legislature going to be able to interpose between onerous laws that the federal government decides to implement and its citizens? That's the question before us."

However, this move is also being strongly opposed by the few Democrats in Idaho's state legislature -- and the office of the state attorney general, a Republican.

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Topics: Health Care, Health Care Reform, Idaho, Lawrence Wasden, Nullification, Vito Barbieri