MARCH 19, 2010

This Week in Health Care Reform

This week, President Obama continued traveling outside of Washington to rally support for his health insurance
plan. Meanwhile, Democratic leaders increased their efforts to pull
together enough votes to push the package through the House of
Representatives by week's end. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) needs
to accumulate 216 votes to pass both the original Senate bill and the
reconciliation bill of "fixes" before the Senate can take up the
reconciliation bill next week.

Health Care Reform Negotiations

Democrats'
"Deem and Pass" Process: On Monday, the House Budget Committee voted
21-16 in favor of advancing the health care reform legislation toward a
final floor vote later in the week. Two Democrats sided with all 14
Republicans on the Committee in voting against the plan.

Meanwhile,
the House Rules Committee spent much of the week waiting for the final
scoring from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which would clear
the way for committee members to pass the reconciliation bill. Once the
bill is approved, Democrats must wait 72 hours in order to give all
lawmakers a chance to review both the original Senate bill and the
reconciliation bill.

On Thursday, the CBO released its final cost estimate of the health insurance
reform bill. The bill would cost taxpayers $940 billion over 10 years,
while trimming the federal deficit by $130 billion in the first 10
years, plus an estimated $1.2 trillion in the second 10 years.

With
the November midterm elections looming, House Democrats are weighing
multiple options for passing this health care reform legislation. One
option Democratic leaders are currently considering would allow the
House to " deem" the original Senate health care reform bill passed
without actually voting on it. Instead, a so-called "self-executing
rule " would deem the Senate's version of health care reform
legislation approved so long as House members also vote on the
reconciliation package. A vote on final passage is expected on the
House floor this Sunday.

Kucinich Changes Vote to Yes on Health
Care Reform: On Wednesday, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) changed his vote
on the health care reform legislation from no to yes, signaling a shift
in votes and a chance for Democrats to win over former opponents of the
bill. Members of the news media report that President Obama lobbied
Rep. Kucinich both privately and publicly to vote in favor of the bill.
Rep. Kucinich's decision signals the first Democrat who originally
opposed the House legislation in November to change his vote, moving
the party closer to the 216 votes needed by this weekend.

Abortion
Issue Remains at Forefront of Debate: Rep. Dale Kildee (D-MI) announced
on Wednesday that he will support the health care reform legislation
and will not oppose it based on the abortion issue. Rep. Kildee, a
strong ally of Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI), says he is satisfied with the
provisions in the Senate-passed bill that seek to limit the use of
federal money for insurance coverage of abortion. This announcement
gave a huge lift to House Democratic leaders, who have been working to
assure abortion opponents that a vote for the bill would not reflect
any change in policy on abortion.

President Obama Continues to
Campaign for Health Care Reform: Throughout the week, the President has
been working to garner increased support for health care reform through
a variety of public forums. On Monday, President Obama traveled to
Strongsville , Ohio, to build support for his health care plan. In his
speech, the President cited rising costs, declining insurance coverage
and the inability of millions of Americans to pay rising insurance
premiums as reasons for overhauling the health care system.

On
Wednesdayevening, the President appeared on Fox News to reiterate his
stance for necessary and immediate reform. And on Friday , the
President heads to the Patriot Center in Fairfax, Virginia, to hold his
fourth and final rally on health care reform.

CBO Scoring of
Reconciliation Bill: On Thursday, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO)
and Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) released their preliminary
scoring of the House reconciliation proposal. Upon release of the
legislative language in the proposal, the CBO will need to review that
language and refine its estimate accordingly.

The CBO estimates
that enacting the Senate and reconciliation bills together would result
in a net reduction to the federal deficit of $138 billion over the
2010-19 period. The reconciliation bill itself would add $20 billion of
net deficit reduction to the Senate bill's $118 billion net deficit
reduction previously estimated by the CBO.

The Congressional
Budget Office also estimated that the deficit reduction effect of the
Senate and reconciliation bills together for the period 2020-29 would
be approximately one-half percent of the GDP. However, the CBO states
that this estimate is imprecise and has a great degree of uncertainty.

Public Opinion

Americans
Continue to Oppose Reform: Opposition to the health care reform plan is
still prevalent in national polling. In a newly released Rasmussen
Reports survey , 53 percent of American voters continue to oppose the
health care reform plan proposed by President Obama and congressional
Democrats. Similar to the numbers last week, 55 percent of those polled
believe health care costs will continue to rise, and 52 percent think
the quality of care will go down. Further, 57 percent believe passage
of the proposal currently working its way through Congress will hurt
the economy.

In a recent Wall Street Journal/NBC poll, 48
percent of voters considered the health care reform bill a "bad idea"
and 36 percent considered it a "good idea," when given a choice between
those two answers. According to the survey, Americans are unhappy with
the job Congress is doing, which is evident by their 17 percent
approval rating. Further, 50 percent of those polled said they would
vote every member of Congress out of office regardless of party
affiliation.

Looking Ahead

Sunday's vote is expected
to move the House closer to final passage of the two bills. And next
week, Senate leaders await their chance to debate the reconciliation
bill on the Senate floor.