WASHINGTON – Turned away at the Supreme Court, congressional Republicans sketched a strategy Friday to repeal the nation’s health care law in 2013 that requires a sweeping election victory carrying Mitt Romney to the presidency and the party at least to narrow control of the Senate.

Romney sought to turn the court’s decision upholding the two-year-old law into a campaign battle cry, saying the 5-4 ruling had injected “greater urgency” into his challenge to President Barack Obama. “I think many people assumed that the Supreme Court would do the work that was necessary in repealing Obamacare,” he said, adding that the justices “did not get that job done.”

Several Republicans seized on a portion of Chief Justice John Roberts’ majority opinion that said the centerpiece of the law, a requirement to purchase insurance, was constitutional because it is based on Congress’ power to impose a tax. “Those who will end up paying the heaviest burden for not buying government-mandated insurance won’t be the wealthiest Americans, but the very middle class families the president claims to defend,” said Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.