Democrats Weigh in On Reconciliation

Kathryn Nix / March 04, 2010

President Obama and congressional leadership are nearing the end of the road on health care reform. The only option left to pass their grandiose visions of a government overhaul of the nation’s health care system into law is to pass the Senate-passed bill in the House.  However, House Democrats will only go along with this if the bill is followed by a side-by-side bill including changes to the Senate bill, which could only clear the Senate using reconciliation, a method which would be both unpopular and unprecedented.

This does not come without its own laundry list of problems, as Democrats acknowledged this morning on National Public Radio’s Morning Edition.  According to Bill Hoagland, a lobbyist for CIGNA and former Republican Staff Director for the Senate Budget Committee, “reconciliation cannot amend something that’s not law…so, if you’re trying to make changes to the health care reform bill to get it more appealing to the House members, they first have to hold their nose and cross their fingers and vote to pass the Senate-passed health care reform bill and send it to the President.” (more…)