#GruberGate: ObamaCare Architect’s “Tale of the Tapes”

American Commitment, a national advocacy organization, is launching a hard-hitting campaign to expose ObamaCare architect Jonathan Gruber’s historic deception regarding the subsidies that were at the center of the recent Halbig decision. The campaign includes a new video detailing Gruber’s apparent dishonesty.

“Jonathan Gruber and the other ObamaCare apologists’ dishonest attacks on conservatives who are asserting the lawful statutory right of states to opt out of Obamacare subsidies and penalties are shameful, willful, and disgusting,” said Phil Kerpen, president of American Commitment. “It was always crystal clear that subsidy eligibility required ‘residing in a state that established an exchange.’ Jonathan Gruber stated this fact unequivocally until after the Halbig decision posed a major threat to ObamaCare. His dishonest attempts to now depict this universally understood provision of the law as a mere ‘typo’ is disgraceful.”

In Halbig, the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that people purchasing health insurance under ObamaCare are only entitled to the “affordability tax credit” (subsidies) if they purchase their insurance through a health exchange established by a state, as the law itself says. This decision is a major blow to President Obama’s signature legislation—because only 14 states and the District of Columbia have decided to create exchanges while 36 have refused.

Since Halbig, ObamaCare architect Jonathan Gruber and his liberal allies have attempted to rewrite the law and history with blatant dishonesty. In contrast to his previous remarks, Gruber is deceitfully claiming that the law’s unambiguous requirement that individuals are only eligible for subsides if they purchase health insurance through an exchange established by a state was just a “typo.”

American Commitment’s “Gruber Gate: Tale of the Tapes” video juxtaposes clips of Jonathan Gruber talking out of both sides of his mouth with contradictory remarks. As the video shows, Jonathan Gruber now claims: “…It is unambiguous this is a typo.”

But in two different speeches in January 2012, Gruber repeatedly acknowledged that subsidy eligibility required residing in a state that established an exchange.

Gruber in 2012: “If you’re a state and you don’t set up an exchange that means your citizens don’t get their tax credits.”

Gruber in 2012: “If your governor doesn’t set up an exchange, you’re losing hundreds of millions of dollars of tax credits to be delivered to your citizens. So that’s the other threat, is will states do what they need to set it up.”

Gruber in 2012: “I guess I’m enough of a believer in democracy, to think that when the voters and states see that by not setting up an exchange the politicians in the state are costing state residents hundreds of millions and billions of dollars that they’ll eventually throw the guys out. But, I don’t know that for sure, and that is really the ultimate threat.”

These remarks were consistent five other comments from Gruber (March 2010, May 2011, November 2011, September 2012, and November 2012) included in the video showing that he believed all 50 states had to establish exchanges for Obamacare to succeed, and states failing to do so constituted “a threat to its effective existence.”

When confronted with Gruber’s previous remarks, the White House could only characterize them as a “mistake.”

The following video can also be viewed online:
 The campaign is using the hashtag #GruberGate on Twitter.
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Phil Kerpen is president of American Commitment. Kerpen is also a contributing author for the ARRA News Service.

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