Round 2: Administration plans quieter promotion of second ObamaCare open enrollment period

Oct. 2, 2013: The Affordable Care Act signup page on the HealthCare.gov website. (REUTERS)

The Obama administration is planning a quieter approach to promoting the second open enrollment for ObamaCare sign-ups and will focus more on targeting procrastinators as the period ends, a White House official confirmed to Fox News Thursday.

Politico was the first to report that the administration is not planning as high-profile a media blitz to promote the enrollment period as it did last year, which included celebrity involvement and frequent interviews with President Obama. The second enrollment period begins on Saturday and ends Feb. 15.

Instead, the official said, the administration is focusing more on the end of the enrollment period. As February draws closer, the administration plans to ramp up promoting enrollment in order to encourage last-minute sign-ups.

The official said that Obama is not taking an active role at this point in the promotion, but the first lady will hold a conference call Friday. Cabinet secretaries like HHS Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Labor Secretary Tom Perez will travel to various states over the next week to encourage sign-ups.

The administration, as it did last year, plans to target key demographics like young people through digital ads and social media, the official said. It will focus less on explaining the law and more on encouraging sign-ups and the mechanics of enrollment.

For example, it plans to resurrect its #bornin88 hashtag to encourage soon-to-be 26-year-olds, who are about to get booted from their parents’ insurance, to sign-up. However this year the hashtag will be #bornin89.

The administration engaged in a full media blitz last year to promote the first ObamaCare open enrollment, which lasted from October 2013 to March 2014. However, the first enrollment was plagued by the rocky rollout of the federal ObamaCare website and the dysfunction of multiple state exchanges.