Romney Campaign at Odds With G.O.P. on Health Care ‘Tax’
On Monday, Eric Fehrnstrom, Mr. Romney’s senior adviser, strayed wildly from the coordinated comments of the Republican leadership on Capitol Hill and other party strategists by saying Mr. Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, agrees with Democrats that Mr. Obama’s health care mandate is not a tax.
“The governor disagreed with the ruling of the court,” Mr. Fehrnstrom said on MSNBC’s “The Daily Rundown” program. “He agreed with the dissent written by Justice Scalia, which very clearly stated that the mandate was not a tax.”
Chuck Todd, the show’s host, suggested that Mr. Romney “believes that you should noit call the tax penalty a tax. You should call it a penalty or a fee or a fine.”
“That’s correct,” Mr. Fehrnstrom said.
The awkwardly off-message response is an example of the difficulty that Mr. Romney has in carrying the conservative mantle on health care — an outcome that Mr. Romney’s Republican rivals predicted during the Republican primaries would come to pass.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/02/romney-campaign-at-odds-with-g-o-p-on-health-care-tax/?hp
