By a 267 to 159 margin, the House of Representatives voted to repeal a component of Obamacare that the administration itself has determined is unworkable. The vote was bipartisan, with at least 28 Democrats joining Republicans in supporting repeal.
The brainchild of the late Ted Kennedy, the CLASS Act became a new long-term care entitlement within President Obama’s national health care law and served as one of the law’s chief accounting gimmicks. Because the CLASS Act was supposed to collect five years of premiums before paying out any benefits, the Democrats were able to claim a short-term surplus from the program as deficit reduction, ignoring the obvious fact that the money would eventually have to pay for benefits. It accounted for half of the health care law’s claimed deficit reduction.
