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House Democrat Wants Someone Fired Over Obamacare Website

During a tele-townhall, Maloney said someone should "lose their job" over the Obamacare website problems. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call File Photo)
During a tele-townhall, Maloney said someone should "lose their job" over the Obamacare website problems. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call File Photo)

An upstate New York Democrat in a swing district is calling for somebody to be fired over the disastrous Obamacare website rollout.

During a Tuesday tele-townhall, Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney answered a caller concerned about the ability of people to get covered and meet the individual mandate to buy health insurance.

Maloney said that he wouldn’t be “sugar coating” the problems with the website.

“I’d like to see somebody lose their job over this. I think it’s outrageous,” he said.

When asked about the comment, Maloney’s office sent a statement to CQ Roll Call.

“I ran my own software company — I know what it takes to meet deadlines,” Maloney said in the statement. “The success of this program and the ability of folks to navigate these exchanges is more important than protecting anyone who failed to do their job.”

Maloney did not specifically call for Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to go. Sebelius is expected to face a grilling when she testifies on Capitol Hill next week, and the White House has been peppered with questions for days about the troubled rollout of the health care exchanges. It’s an open question whether other Democrats in swing states and districts like Maloney’s will call for heads to roll.

Tim Miller, the executive director of the conservative America Rising political action committee, said the troubled launch of the website will hurt Democrats next year.

“Democrats who were cheerleading Obamacare for the past four years aren’t going to be able to hide behind Johnny-come-lately complaints about implementation in the midterms,” he said.

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