Two of members of the Obama Administration would not rule out the possibility of a tax on health benefits to pay for a system-wide overhaul in TV interviews.

Secretary of Health and Human Service Kathleen Sebelius appeared on Fox News Sunday (June 28), indicating that President Barack Obama is partial to paying for reform efforts through an estimated $660 billion over 10 years pledged by stakeholders, including insurers and pharmaceutical companies.

She added there is another approximately $330 billion over the next decade through capping the itemized deduction.

“[Obama] thinks that is far preferable to the ideas currently being discussed about taxing employee benefits,” Sebelius told host Bret Baier.

Baier countered that plans in both the House and Senate include an element of taxing employee benefits and asked if the president would sign a bill with such a stipulation.

Sebelius said “discussions are under way” and that the president wants to “keep people at the table and figure out the best strategy going forward.”

“The bottom line is the president will not sign a bill that’s not paid for,” Sebelius said. “The bill must be paid for and not add a dime to the deficit.”

She also repeated Obama’s opposition to Sen. John McCain’s idea “to eliminate the benefits, the non-taxable benefits” as the president “figures that would really dismantle the employer marketplace.”

“I think that he’s open to discussion but prefers, again, capping the itemized deduction, returning it to the days of Ronald Reagan,” she said. “For the top 2 percent of Americans, they would pay the same itemized deduction that they had during the Reagan days, and he thinks that’s a preferable payment mechanism.”

Also getting back to campaign promises was White House political advisor David Axelrod, appearing on ABC’s “This Week.”

When asked by host George Stephanopoulous whether the president would veto any health reform bill going against campaign promises of nor tax increase for those making less than $250,000, Axelrod said any bill must not add to the nation’s deficit.

“Two-thirds of the expenses  – two-thirds of the expense of it under the president’s plan and proposal would be done by transferring money within the health care system from Medicare on wasteful spending, giveaways to insurance and drug companies, and so on,” Axelrod said.  And so we’re talking about the final third. He has proposed a plan that would be in keeping with the promise that he made, to cap deductions for the wealthiest Americans on their taxes.”

Stephanopoulous added that the president has shown some support for taxing health benefits, going against his campaign promise as well. Axelrod countered that the president believes taxing health benefits is not “necessarily the best way to go here.”

“One of the problems we’ve had in this town is that people draw lines in the sand and they stop talking to each other,” Axelrod said. “And you don’t get anything done. That’s not the way the president approaches us.”