The Hill reports today, “The Health and Human Services Department has signed a $20 million contract with a public-relations firm to highlight part of the Affordable Care Act.” According to PR Week, which first reported on the contract, “‘The campaign will inform the American people about the many preventive benefits now available to those with Medicare, Medicaid, and private health insurance as a result of the Affordable Care Act,’ a representative from the Department of Health & Human Services said.” So once again, the Obama administration will be spending millions of taxpayer dollars to sell the public on Democrats’ still unpopular (and unconstitutional) health care law.

Of course, this isn’t the first time this administration has spent tax dollars to promote Obamacare. Back in 2010, the Obama administration spent $3 million in October alone on TV ads promoting their health care bill. Factcheck.org called the promise made in one of the ads saying Medicare benefits would stay the same “fictional.” Earlier that year, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) sent a mailer, again paid for with taxpayer money, touting the health care law, that was starkly at odds with the CMS actuary’s own skeptical analysis of Obamacare.

Writing about today’s news, Lachlan Markey of The Heritage Foundation points out, “Last year, HHS asked Congress to quadruple the budget for its public affairs office – to nearly $20 million – and nearly double the size of the office’s staff. The department insisted the changes were necessary to ‘help Americans understand and access their benefits and information under the law.’”

The Daily Caller’s Matt Lewis noticed something else interesting about the HHS announcement. “The story [in The Hill] notes that the public relations firm Porter Novelli ‘won the contract after a competitive bidding process.’ Interestingly,” Lewis writes “the managing director of Porter Novellis’ Washington D.C. office is Catherine “Kiki” McLean — a true ‘D.C. insider,’ according to her bio. Indeed she is. Among her other accomplishments, McLean’s bio also notes she was ‘an on-air surrogate for the Obama for America campaign.’ This, of course, raises a few questions, including: Just how competitive was the competitive bid process that went to a senior Democrat? And isn’t this the kind of insider access Obama decried in 2008?

Related:

Cong. Carnahan: “Protesting ObamaCare is An Attack On Our Representative System of Govt.”

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Rasmussen Reports: 55% Favor Repeal of Health Care Law; 56% Expect Costs to Rise

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