AUGUSTA — About 75 supporters of the federal health care reform law gathered Wednesday outside the State House to rally against what they called “recent attacks” on health care.

Maine Attorney General William Schneider announced Tuesday he had taken steps for Maine to join a multistate lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of parts of the new reform law. On Wednesday, the Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives took votes to repeal the law.

“This is not acceptable,” said Jennie Pirkl, the health care organizer at the Maine People’s Alliance, an organization that advocates for low-income Mainers. “People want and need the Affordable Care Act. More than 2,600 people sent postcards to the governor’s office last week telling him how much we want and need this law.”

But Gov. Paul LePage, a Republican, has said he supports Schneider’s decision to challenge the law.

Pirkl said many Mainers support many of the provisions in the law, including the elimination of lifetime insurance caps, the ability for insurance companies to deny coverage to individuals with pre-existing conditions, and allowing for adults up to age 26 to remain covered by their parents’ insurance,

AARP Maine State President Carol Kontos; Rep. Sharon Treat, D-Hallowell; and Dan Meyer, a small-business owner from Readfield, also spoke in support of the legislation.

Kontos said the lawsuit, which challenges specifically the federal government’s ability to force most citizens to purchase health insurance or else face a fine beginning in 2014, is “counterproductive and harmful for our members in Maine.”

Treat, a leading Democrat on health care reform issues, said she opposes the lawsuit as well as a bill proposed by a Republican lawmaker that would make it illegal to implement any part of the federal law.

“A repeal will cause real harm to real people,” she said. “The decision to join this suit is in sharp contrast to the bipartisan work that state lawmakers have been engaging in this past year to help Maine implement the important patient protections and benefits of this law.”

Tarren Bragdon said he supports the lawsuit and the bill to prevent implementation.

Bragdon is chief executive officer of the Maine Heritage Policy Center, a conservative leaning think tank; and also was a key member of LePage’s transition team.

“There will be a lot of tinkering with this law over the next two years, and so the Legislature should not be premature in implementing a law that may not be there in a couple of years,” he said.

Rebekah Metzler — 620-7016

rmetzler@mainetoday.com