Congressman Chris Gibson

I voted "no" tonight on attaching a one-year delay of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) to the latest version of a “Continuing Resolution (CR)” because I don’t agree with this approach.

I believe the Senate will reject this CR and we'll be back to square one on Monday, increasing the likelihood of a government shutdown – which I oppose.

From my perspective, the desired end state remains the same - a delay of the Affordable Care Act / Obamacare and a temporary lifting of the sequester - both to January 2015. However, we need a successful strategy to get that implemented and this approach will not do it.

What we should do instead is take the Senate CR and add a simple amendment - overturning the Obama Administration's recent rule providing health care insurance subsidies for Members of Congress and their staff.

The Administration made an exception for Congress to permit these benefits. “Fixing” this problem for Congress before the American people are protected from adverse impacts of the law is wrong.

I believe this amendment would likely pass the Senate, thus ending the stalemate over the continuing resolution and preventing a shutdown. More importantly, in the coming weeks as negotiations continue I think adopting this simple amendment is our best opportunity to delay implementation of Obamacare. Once Congress is forced to live within the letter of the law, all parties (including the Democrats who still support it) will be much more willing to recognize the significant issues facing the ACA and agree to delay its implementation.

The President has repeatedly said: “I’m not going to negotiate.” The democratic process doesn’t work that way. Both parties need to work together – and that means sincere negotiations and compromise.

But we can’t give up. We can still forge a bipartisan, long-term solution that funds our government, raises the debt ceiling, lifts the sequester, and delays the ACA for one year. My approach would start us down that path and I encourage the President, the Speaker and the Senate Majority Leader to consider it immediately.