Health Care Tax | featured news

Can the Internal Revenue Service police President Obama's health care mandate while simultaneously collecting all the taxes for running the federal government? The question is being renewed in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision upholding most of the 2010 Affordable Care Act as a tax issue rather than one of interstate commerce.

Mr. Romney's remarks, made in a hastily arranged interview with CBS News on a national holiday, prompted renewed criticisms that he was willing to adjust his views for political expediency. Two days earlier, his chief spokesman and senior strategist had said that Mr. Romney did not believe the mandate should be called a tax.

Mitt Romney's campaign is aligning itself with President Barack Obama—and breaking from Republican leaders—by saying the government will be imposing a penalty, not a tax, on people who don't buy insurance as required by the new health-care law. The break from his Republican allies illustrates the difficulty the presumptive GOP presidential nominee faces in criticizing the president for a national health-care law that resembles the one Mr. Romney signed as Massachusetts governor. Both laws include a requirement that most individuals buy insurance coverage.