Congressman Tom Price, M.D.

1/19/2010
The Fallout: Democrats Rethinking Health Care Bill

Politico
Carrie Budoff Brown & Patrick O'Connor
January 19, 2010

Republican Scott Brown’s upset win in Massachusetts on Tuesday threatened to derail hopes of passing a health reform bill this year, as the White House and Democratic leaders faced growing resistance from rank-and-file members to pressing ahead with a bill following the Bay State backlash.

Democratic leaders and the White House insisted ahead of the vote that they aren’t preparing to desert health care. They admit they’ll have to come up with a new strategy to win passage but said they didn’t want to allow one Senate race to take them off course on the president’s top legislative item for the year.

But several House members said Tuesday night that they had no interest in pursuing the most likely scenario for moving ahead with a bill — approving the already-passed Senate version of health reform in the House — and some said President Barack Obama should step back and start over.

In fact, early signs of split emerged as the polls closed in Massachusetts — between leaders like House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), who said, “The Senate bill is better than nothing” and individual members who didn’t want to swallow the Senate’s version of health reform whole.

And with the winning majority for a health reform bill in the House so thin, almost any defections at this point would be fatal to reform’s prospects.

"I've maintained for months now that incremental reform in the health care package would make much more sense from my perspective," said California Rep. Jim Costa, one of the last Democrats to vote yes on the House bill.

He said he'd like to see Obama tell voters that "we may have been overreaching" and then push for a scaled-back bill that focuses on things more people can agree on, like insurance reforms. He said it's not just a question of the House bill versus the Senate bill. "For me, it's broader than that," Costa said.

Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), one of the leading advocates for health reform in the House, said, "I don't think it would be the worst thing to take a step back and say we are going to pivot to do a jobs thing" and include elements of health care reform in it.

"If there isn't any recognition that we got the message and we are trying to recalibrate and do things differently, we are not only going to risk looking ignorant but arrogant,” he said.

House leaders left a Tuesday night caucus meeting and immediately retired to the speaker's office to plot the path forward. Staff weren't allowed in.

Hoyer said Democrats are "still working on trying to get an agreement."

"Psychologically, does Massachusetts have an impact? Certainly, it does. But the objective hasn't changed. We're going to continue to work on achieving that objective," Hoyer told POLITICO.

Politico