The Hill News

GOP lawmakers released a flurry of supportive tweets on Monday after the Supreme Court announced they will hear a challenge to President Obama’s healthcare law.

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio) tweeted: “Pleased to hear #SCOTUS will rule on ObamaCare. The [healthcare reform] law is destroying jobs in America & must be repealed. #hcrcostsjobs #pledge”

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), chairman of the House Budget Committee, who has criticized the healthcare bill as an economic drain, reacted with strong support of the Supreme Court’s decision to consider the case in a press release.

Ryan’s press office tweeted that the healthcare reform law’s “place in history has not yet been decided. If this passes, the quest to reclaim the American Idea IS NOT OVER.”

Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) defended the constitutionality of Obama’s healthcare law. “I welcome Supreme Court’s decision to consider challenges to [h! ealthcare reform], confident the Court will uphold constitutionality”

Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz) indicated the opposite in his tweet: “Fully expect they will find it unconstitutional,” also noting the “unusually long 5.5 [hours] of oral argument.”

And Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) focused on one aspect of the healthcare bill most unpopular with Republicans: The individual mandate.

“[Government] should not have the powerto force you to buy anything,” he tweeted.

Republicans have been pushing hard for individual state challenges to the healthcare law, commonly referred to as “ObamaCare,” and the Supreme Court’s announcement has been hotly anticipated since the bill passed in late 2009.