House GOP leader says healthcare fight won’t drag down Romney

The GOP’s fight against President Obama’s healthcare law won’t prevent Mitt Romney from winning a run for the White House, the second-ranking House Republican said Tuesday. 

Conservative critics say the plan Romney implemented as governor of Massachusetts essentially resembles Obama’s, and the similarities have cast doubts on whether Romney can win a GOP primary in 2012. 

House Republicans voted to repeal the new healthcare law as one of their first actions after taking the majority, but House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said that fight wouldn’t cancel out Romney’s presidential ambitions.

“I don’t think so,” Cantor said on CNBC when asked if congressional Republicans’ fight against President Obama’s healthcare reform law would be a drag on Romney.

Cantor’s defense comes after a week in which several top GOP competitors to Romney and Obama himself took shots at the Republican for the Massachusetts healthcare plan. 

Not all Republicans have joined the pile-on of “RomneyCare,” though. Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R) consciously avoided an opportunity to hit his possible campaign-trail foe.

“I’m going to try to abide by Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment, which we are not going to talk negatively about other folks,” Pawlenty said Monday night on Fox News.

House GOP leaders must walk an even finer line as the 2012 presidential election gets under way.

While they each might have their own private preferences about candidates, if leaders like Cantor were to weigh in on behalf of presidential aspirants, it could risk the perception of overlap between the actions of the Republican House and the campaigns of certain GOP candidates.

“I’m not saying who it is that may emerge, but all I can tell you is that we have a chance, as Republicans in the House, to demonstrate what effective Republican leadership should be about,” Cantor said.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has been diligent about avoiding saying whom he wants to see win the nomination, or saying which candidate he thinks might have a leg up in the wide-open field.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), by contrast, had openly cheered on Sen. John Thune’s (R-S.D.) potential candidacy, but hasn’t stated any other preference since Thune declined to run.

Cantor did endorse Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) during the 2008 Republican presidential primary, but not until Romney had dropped out and McCain’s nomination seemed like a foregone conclusion.

“If we do our job right, we can set up the choice for the electorate in 2012,” the majority leader said.