House GOP campaign chief: ObamaCare a ‘political hurricane’

ObamaCare is a “category five political hurricane” for Democrats, the chairman of the House GOP’s campaign arm said Friday.

National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.) said he’s long believed ObamaCare would be the driving force for the 2014 elections.

{mosads}”Now it has become a category five political hurricane,” he told reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast. “It is not just causing havoc in certain regions of the country. It is ripping apart every region of the country, from tiny hamlets to towns to major cities. People are finding out confusion, chaos, cancellations, cost increases — all of which were predicted.”

Walden predicted his party has “the ability to net gain seats in 2014” because of the program’s botched rollout and ongoing struggles. He also said he believed the healthcare law would continue to founder through the next election.

Walden ripped President Obama for lying to the voters and said the result would be a tough year at the polls for Democrats.

“The American people feel very misled, and a bond of trust has been broken,” he said. “When you lose that trust it’s a very difficult thing to get back.”

Polls show that ObamaCare’s calamitous rollout has badly damaged Obama and Democrats, and completely erased the advantage they had following the government shutdown, which hurt Republicans.

Democrats predict those numbers will flip again if Republicans shut down the government again in January, when the next fight over government funding looms.

Walden predicted the GOP would “work through” internal divisions on how to best attack government spending but said his party should avoid another government shutdown.

He also mocked Democrats who have been critical of the Obama administration’s rollout of the healthcare law, pointing out that most of them backed the law and comparing them to bank robbers who offer to return the money they stole after they’re caught. He predicted other parts of ObamaCare would prove unpopular with the voters as they’re implemented as well.

“ObamaCare will live on — with the cost increases, the huge chaos and cancellations, and I think that will be the dominant issue because that affects everyone,” he said. “When people figure out they can no loungers see their doctor, that will be the next less-than-truthful promise.”