The Power of A

Facing the August recess and constituents who have a wide range of opinions on health care, the House and Senate attempts to pass comprehensive health care reform hit major road blocks yesterday.

The much-rumored dissension on the Blue Dogs deal on HR 3200 was made public yesterday.  Some of the House liberal caucuses released a letter yesterday to the Democratic leadership pledging to vote against any bill that incorporated the changes requested by the Blue Dog.  They specifically cited reimbursement rates in the public plan not being coupled to Medicare repayments and the reduction in low-income subsidies.  The letter was signed by 57 members, more than enough to defeat any bill brought to a vote on the House floor.  However, news broke Friday morning that a deal had been struck to allow the Energy & Commerce Committee to pass the bill, although complete details have yet to be released.

On the Senate side, Finance Committee negotiators and Senate Democratic leaders admitted that a bill would not be released from the committee before the August recess.  Finance Committee Chair Max Baucus (D-MT) spent most of the day deliberating with his Democratic members on controversial aspects of the bill.  It may have been erroneous news reports, however, that helped torpedo the negotiations.  After some newspapers reported Wednesday that a bill was close to being released, Finance Committee Republicans stated that negotiations were still a ways off, with Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY) calling negotiations “a train wreck.”

The one place where progress was made on health care legislation was in the Energy & Commerce Committee, which held its fourth day of mark-ups on HR 3200.  Among the amendments adopted by the committee:

-          The Markey amendment: directs HHS to conduct a pilot program on physician home-care (agreed by voice vote)

-          The Rogers amendment: states the government will not use specific research to ration or deny health care (agreed by voice vote)

-          The Capps amendment: prohibits spending of government money by private insurers to cover abortions, and requiring all state exchanges to have at least one plan covering abortion and one not covering (agreed 30-28)

-          The Stupak amendment: codifies a conscience clause on abortion (agreed by voice vote)

Notable amendments that were not approved include:

-          The Burgess amendment(1): prohibits the creation of a public plan (failed 24-35)

-          The Burgess amendment(2): decouples the public plan payments from Medicare (failed 29-29)

-          The Deal amendment: prohibits illegal immigrants from receiving medical benefits (failed 28-29)

-          The Blunt amendment: requires the president, vice president, and members of Congress to enroll in the Exchange (ruled non-germane by a 36-22-1 vote)

Quick Hits

The House Democrats memo on how to discuss health care reform over the August recess was leaked… Senator Grassley promises not to sell out party… Are health care reform proponents blaming too much on the insurance companies?