Congressional Leaders Look to Exclude Republicans from Health Care Reform Discussions
With different versions of health care reform legislation now having passed the House (H.R. 3962) and the Senate (H.R. 3590), Democratic leaders are looking to bypass the traditional methods by which Congress would negotiate a compromise between the two bills. Generally, a formal conference committee would be formed with House and Senate members from both parties to meld the two pieces of legislation into one. However, according to some on Capitol Hill, Democratic leadership in Congress is looking to hold a series of informal meetings to construct a single piece of legislation to be voted on by both chambers of Congress. The process will include the administration, but will exclude Republican lawmakers from the process.
The most likely course is to have the House take up any amended legislation first and then have it acted upon by the Senate, which would need to hold together its tenuous 60-vote majority. In order to retain enough votes for Senate passage, the House will apparently need to abandon the public option provision that was a key part of the House legislation. Other issues to be reconciled include the structure of insurance exchanges; date of implementation; abortion funding provisions; employer mandate structure; funding; and premium subsidies levels. The exact timeframe for the process is unclear, but congressional leaders and the administration are hoping to have a bill passed, and possibly enacted, before President Obama's State of the Union address in early February.