Buy Insurance or Go to Jail?

ABC News' Teddy Davis reports:

The debate over whether the federal government should require all Americans to carry health insurance is heating up.

The latest spark is a letter that Thomas Barthold, the chief of staff to the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation, sent Thursday to Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev.

Given that the health-care bill written by Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus contains a $1,900 fee (or excise tax) for not buying health insurance, Ensign wanted to know what would happen if an American didn't pay the penalty.

In a handwritten letter, Barthold told Ensign that under an existing provision of the Internal Revenue Code, willful failure to pay a fine can result in being charged with a misdemeanor which could carry a penalty of up to $25,000, or up to a year in jail, or both. The handwritten letter was a follow-up to an answer that Barthold gave Ensign during Thursday's mark-up of the Baucus bill.

Barthold felt that he was not as thorough during the hearing as he could be after considering the Internal Revenue Code.

During last year's campaign, then-Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., opposed an individual mandate. In fact, he clashed repeatedly with Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., his future Secretary of State, on this issue.

Since becoming president, however, he has switched his stance and now shares Clinton's view that an individual mandate is necessary in order to achieve new federal protections for individuals with pre-existing conditions.

Pointing to experience at the state level, the insurance industry and other health-care experts persuaded Obama that insurers could not go along with a guanteed issue policy without knowing that all adults would be forced into the system.

Insurers say that if you have guaranteed issue — which means no discrimination on the basis of pre-existing conditions — without an individual mandate, people will wait until they become sick to buy insurance and the system will fail due to a lack of risk sharing.

Advocates of an individual mandate say that a requirement to buy insurance is essential because everyone is currently paying a “hidden tax” when people show up in the emergency room without insurance. (Under existing law, emergency rooms are required to treat urgent care matters without regard to ability to pay. If the patient cannot afford the bill, those costs are then passed to the government or people who have insurance in the form of higher prices).

When considering the possible jail penalty, it should be noted that President Obama envisions an individual mandate being structured with some sort of hardship exemption.

The Baucus health-care bill being considered by the Senate Finance Committee would exempt individuals who meet a government defined “unable to pay definition”. There would also be an exemption for people whose religion conflicts with the mandate.

Despite the fact that there is broad support for an individual mandate among Democratic politicians, the insurance industry, many experts, and even a few Republicans, Barthold's letter potentially hands the GOP a big new weapon in the fight against Democratic efforts to overhaul the nation's health-care system.

View Barthold's letter to Ensign by clicking HERE.

It was scanned by Ensign's Senate office and provided to ABC News. The accuracy of its contents was confirmed by the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation.

Buy Insurance or Go to Jail?

ABC News' Teddy Davis reports:

The debate over whether the federal government should require all Americans to carry health insurance is heating up.

The latest spark is a letter that Thomas Barthold, the chief of staff to the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation, sent Thursday to Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev.

Given that the health-care bill written by Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus contains a $1,900 fee (or excise tax) for not buying health insurance, Ensign wanted to know what would happen if an American didn't pay the penalty.

In a handwritten letter, Barthold told Ensign that under an existing provision of the Internal Revenue Code, willful failure to pay a fine can result in being charged with a misdemeanor which could carry a penalty of up to $25,000, or up to a year in jail, or both. The handwritten letter was a follow-up to an answer that Barthold gave Ensign during Thursday's mark-up of the Baucus bill.

Barthold felt that he was not as thorough during the hearing as he could be after considering the Internal Revenue Code.

During last year's campaign, then-Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., opposed an individual mandate. In fact, he clashed repeatedly with Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., his future Secretary of State, on this issue.

Since becoming president, however, he has switched his stance and now shares Clinton's view that an individual mandate is necessary in order to achieve new federal protections for individuals with pre-existing conditions.

Pointing to experience at the state level, the insurance industry and other health-care experts persuaded Obama that insurers could not go along with a guanteed issue policy without knowing that all adults would be forced into the system.

Insurers say that if you have guaranteed issue — which means no discrimination on the basis of pre-existing conditions — without an individual mandate, people will wait until they become sick to buy insurance and the system will fail due to a lack of risk sharing.

Advocates of an individual mandate say that a requirement to buy insurance is essential because everyone is currently paying a “hidden tax” when people show up in the emergency room without insurance. (Under existing law, emergency rooms are required to treat urgent care matters without regard to ability to pay. If the patient cannot afford the bill, those costs are then passed to the government or people who have insurance in the form of higher prices).

When considering the possible jail penalty, it should be noted that President Obama envisions an individual mandate being structured with some sort of hardship exemption.

The Baucus health-care bill being considered by the Senate Finance Committee would exempt individuals who meet a government defined “unable to pay definition”. There would also be an exemption for people whose religion conflicts with the mandate.

Despite the fact that there is broad support for an individual mandate among Democratic politicians, the insurance industry, many experts, and even a few Republicans, Barthold's letter potentially hands the GOP a big new weapon in the fight against Democratic efforts to overhaul the nation's health-care system.

View Barthold's letter to Ensign by clicking HERE.

It was scanned by Ensign's Senate office and provided to ABC News. The accuracy of its contents was confirmed by the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation.

DOJ Seeks Release of 2 Alaska Politicians from Jail

ABC News Jason Ryan reports: The Justice Department has filed two motions to release two former Alaska politicians from jail following recent information that prosecutors and Justice Department officials who worked on the case of Sen. Ted Stevens also withheld evidence during the trial of these two men as well.

The Justice Department has been conducting an internal review of how the prosecutors on the Stevens case acted and carried out their duties and it appears other cases may have been unfairly pursued by the Justice Department prosecutors on the cases. The men Victor Kohring, a former state representative, and Peter Kott, a former Alaska house speaker, have been appealing their cases, especially after the debacle of the Stevens case being dismissed.

The case against Stevens and other public corruption investigations gained momentum in May 2007 after two top VECO executives, CEO Bill Allen and former Vice President of Community Affairs and Government Relations Richard Smith, pleaded guilty to shuttling more than $400,000 to various elected officials in Alaska. Last September the former speaker of the House, Kott, was convicted by a jury on public corruption charges for accepting funds to use his official position to benefit the company.

The Justice Department motions filed today in the 9th circuit court of Appeals note, “the process has uncovered material that, at this stage, appears to be information that should have been, but was not, disclosed to Appellant [Kott andKohring] before his trial.”

Kohring was found guilty of bribery, conspiracy, and extortion in 2007 and was sentenced to 42 months in prison on May 8, 2008.

In a statement Attorney General Eric Holder said, ““After a careful review of these cases, I have determined that it appears that the Department did not provide information that should have been disclosed to the defense…Department of Justice prosecutors work hard every day and perform a great service for the American people. But the Department’s mission is to do justice, not just win cases, and when we make mistakes, it is our duty to admit and correct those mistakes. We are committed to doing that.”

The Justice Department attorneys who were involved in these cases were Nicholas Marsh from Justice Department headquarters and James Goeke and Joseph Bottini from the US Attorney's office in Alaska.

In the Stevens case, which was dismissed April 1, 2009, there have been internal reviews at the FBI underway that the agents on the case acted improperly and reviews by the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility into the actions of the prosecutors on the case.

An FBI whistleblower lawsuit began to reveal many of the problems with the Stevens case and possibly other cases in Alaska. The FBI whistleblower, agent Chad Joy, has alleged the lead agent on the cases Mary Beth Kepner had an inappropriate relationship with the government's star witnesses in the case and that she disclosed investigative details to people possibly under investigation in Alaska linked to the Stevens probe.

Joy has also alleged misconduct during by the prosecutors including allegations that Marsh did not even turn over boxes of evidence in the Stevens case to the FBI to be properly entered into evidence databases. An affidavit filed by Agent Joy noted, “When I arrived at Public Integrity Section in Washington DC to prepare for the trial of Ted Stevens, I found many boxes of documents stacked outside the office of Nick Marsh. The FBI did not have custody of any of the material and the evidence had not been reviewed by FBI personnel.”

Following the dismissal of the Stevens cases and review of the other Alaska cases Attorney General Eric Holder and head of the Criminal Division Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer have implemented reforms so that all Criminal Division prosecutors can review how to handle proper procedures of information constitutionally required to be given to defendants and defense counsel.

Today Breuer said in a statement, “We will continue regular discovery training for all Criminal Division prosecutors to make certain that they perform their duties in adherence to the highest ethical standards.”

Saberi Says the National Anthem Sustained Her in Iranian Jail

ABC News’ Kirit Radia reports:

Roxana Saberi touched down on U.S. soil today after four months in a notorious Iranian prison.

The journalist told reporters upon arrival in Washington, D.C., that she sustained her spirits during her detention by signing the national anthem to herself. Incidentally, the lyrics to “The Star Spangled Banner” were written by Francis Scott Key as he was detained aboard a British ship in 1814.

“One thing that kept me going in prison was singing the national anthem to myself,” Saberi said. “And it may sound corny, but I’m so happy to be back home in the land of the free.”

As Saberi emerged from customs, she was greeted by loud cheers and applause from members of the crowd at Dulles International Airport on hand to welcome their own family members, but who were tipped off to Saberi’s arrival by the large number of television cameras on hand.

Saberi thanked President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the congressional delegation from her native North Dakota and the media for keeping her story alive. She also had thanks for the Iranian people who helped her parents through a difficult time.

Saberi, a U.S. citizen whose father emigrated from Iran, was a freelance journalist in Iran for the past six years. She was detained by Iranian authorities earlier this year, but the charges against her changed several times. She initially was charged with operating with expired press credentials, then for having purchased a bottle of wine against Iranian law. Finally, she was put on trial for espionage, allegedly for having obtained an Iranian government report about the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq.

The Obama administration vigorously denied she was a U.S. spy and urged that she be released on “humanitarian” grounds. Saberi herself went on a hunger strike to protest the charges.

She finally was released two weeks ago after an intervention by Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is running for re-election next month.