While Democrats say the issue has been settled, Republicans argue the debate over health care reform is not over yet.

One day after the Supreme Court announced its decision to uphold the controversial health care law passed in 2010, the GOP is pushing a message Friday that the law imposes a substantial tax hike on the American public.

"What happened yesterday calls for greater urgency, I believe, in the election," Romney said at a New York City fund-raiser Friday morning.

A focal point of the high court's deliberation was the law's individual mandate, which will eventually require people to buy health insurance or pay a fee.

The court ruled that the fee was a tax rather than a penalty, and therefore decided the law was constitutional.

"It is reasonable to construe what Congress has done as increasing taxes on those who have a certain amount of income, but choose to go without health insurance," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion. "Such legislation is within Congress's power to tax."

Republicans, however, point to a 2009 interview in which President Barack Obama forcefully argued against the notion that the fee would amount to a tax.

"For us to say that you've got to take responsibility to get health insurance is absolutely not a tax increase," he told ABC News.

Now that the high court says it is a tax, however, Republicans are taking it and running with it as a major sticking point against the health care law.

"Make no mistake about it: This is a whopping tax on the citizens of the United States," Gov. Bob McDonnell of Virginia said on a conference call Friday organized by the Republican National Committee.