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Yesterday, the Supreme Court upheld President Obama’s health care law. While I respect the court, I strongly disagree with this decision. Hoosiers deserve health care reforms that work. Unfortunately, this law just gives bureaucrats more control over our daily lives. My freshman colleagues and I were sent to Congress to put the brakes on this kind of government intrusion. This decision, though certainly a blow to limited government, cannot and will not be the last chapter in the ongoing effort to repeal this destructive law.

 

While five judges reached the wrong decision, millions of Americans have long held the law in contempt. According to the latest Gallup poll, an overwhelming 70% of all Americans believe the individual mandate is unconstitutional. Our political system is built on the idea that government works best when it is carefully checked and limited. The individual mandate undermines that foundation. A federal government powerful enough to force citizens to buy health insurance or any other product for that matter is more powerful than anything our Founding Fathers envisioned.

 

This is exactly why I will continue to work to repeal the entirety of the President’s health care law. Like the President and the justices of the high court, members of the House took oaths to uphold and defend the Constitution. I take my oath seriously and do not believe that the Constitution gives the federal government this sweeping power. Members of the legislative branch must exercise our authority to repeal this law.

 

House Republicans have voted to repeal, defund, or dismantle the President’s health care law thirty times. This is the largest tax hike in American history and will harm families and small businesses during the weakest recovery since the Great Depression. Nearly 75% of small businesses say that the law makes it more difficult for them to hire more employees. Americans deserve better.

 

My colleagues and I will move to entirely repeal this law. We can get reform right if we debate new health care legislation in the full light of day.

 

Instead of replacing the President’s law with another lengthy and convoluted bill, my colleagues and I in the House will continue the work of reform with a fresh slate and careful attention to patient needs and free-market principles.

 

In the past decade, health care costs have more than doubled. Those costs will only soar higher if consumers are not able to make individual decisions. Unfortunately, President Obama’s health care law eliminates individual choices, relies on bureaucratic controls, and drives prices up. Rather than expanding government control through individual mandates and discouraging innovation through top-down policies, we can work to promote individual choice and empower patients.

 

Americans in the real economy know these policies do not work for them. The vast majority of hardworking taxpayers see the law for what it is—an unprecedented exercise in federal overreach. The American people, acting through their representatives in Congress can set this right. My colleagues and I will act to repeal the President’s law and enact true reforms that put patients first.

 

This column originally ran in the News-Sentinel.