The Senate Finance Committee narrowly reported out legislation today that would bring about a major transformation in health care in this country, adding millions of people who are currently uninsured to the insurance rolls.
The bill reported by the Finance Committee, by a 14-9 mostly party-line vote, would cost an estimated $829 billion. However, the bill -- essentially the version sponsored by Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) -- would provide $80 billion savings over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The measure does not include the controversial “public option” of a government-run insurance company to compete with private insurers, which is included in four other congressional versions of the bill. However, the public option could be added on the Senate floor.
The vote was along party lines, with US Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) providing the only Republican “aye” for the measure. The South’s two Democrats on the committee, US Sens. Blanche Lincoln (AR) Bill Nelson (FL), both voted yes. Nelson’s “aye” vote was expected; Lincoln, however, had been officially undecided until about an hour before the vote was taken. The two Southern Republicans on the Finance Committee, Jim Bunning (KY) and John Cornyn (TX), voted with the majority of their party -- all except Snowe -- against the bill.
The Finance Committee’s action sets up a serious confrontation for the Senate floor. To pass the Senate with enough votes to survive a filibuster, proponents would need 60 votes, making each vote on the measure crucial. Snowe and Lincoln, might not support the bill on final passage if it includes the public option.
Whether or not health care reform passes has important political implications, not only for President Obama, but for lawmakers in both parties who will be facing the voters next year. For Obama and his fellow Democrats, passage of health care reform would fulfill one of his key campaign promises and give his party a major talking point for the 2010 elections.
For the GOP, defeat of the bill would show the party’s grass roots activists that their strenuous -- at times raucous -- opposition to Obama’s health care proposals had some effect, and would demonstrate that their party still has clout in congress. And it would add energy to Republican efforts to retake control of congress, or at least increase the party’s strength in both the senate and house.
Sen. Lincoln’s (D-AR) decision to support the measure could provide ammunition for the strong Republican effort to defeat her next year in Arkansas. Although her fundraising is strong -- $4.1 million on hand as of September 30 -- a recent poll showed she trailed all four Republicans who are in the running to oppose her. Opposition to the Obama Administration’s domestic proposals, including health care, cap-and-trade and other labor law changes, has been especially strong in Arkansas. In a statement released following the Finance Committee vote, Lincoln said, “I voted for the Senate Finance Committee’s health care reform bill because health care costs are already rising too fast for Arkansas individuals and families…Although it isn’t a perfect bill, I believe that opposing all reform is simply not an option.”
Nelson’s support for the bill may be better received in Florida. He does not come up for re-election until 2012. If health care reform has become law by then, he could be helped or hurt by how the new law is received, especially in the Sunshine State’s numerous and politically powerful senior citizen community.
