Update: Senate clears major hurdles with Health Care Bill

By Mitch Gurney

December 22, 2009

Very early this morning the Senate cleared some major hurdles and advances closer to passing their version of the health care bill.

Please see the following for further details, available via OpenCongress.org:

December 22, 2009:

Senate Still on Track to Pass Health Care Reform by Christmas

Today’s votes were on passage of the manager’s amendment (.pdf), which contains the meat of the “deal” that won unanimous support for the bill among Democrats, and on ending a filibuster of the substitute amendment (as amended by the manager’s amendment), which is basically the underlying Senate health care bill. Both votes passed along party lines, with all 60 Democrats voting in favor and all Republicans that were present voting against

Under Senate rules, Republicans can (and are expected to) now require 30 more hours of debate before the Senate votes on passage of the substitute amendment, which means it will take place tomorrow at about 1 p.m. After that, there will be a vote on wrapping up debate of the bill itself (as amended by the substitute amendment as amended by the manager’s amendment). After that, Republicans could again hold debate of the bill open for 30 hours, but there is now some indication that Republican and Democratic leaders are working out a deal to allow a final vote on passage of the bill happen on Wednesday in order to avoid ice storms in the mid-west that could hinder senators’ holiday travel plans.

Once it passes, what happens next?

Once the Senate passes their bill, Congress will break for the holidays and not come back until mid to late January. While they are away on recess though, a conference committee made up of committee leaders from the Senate and House will meet to reconcile the different House and Senate health care bills in to a final version that must be approved again by both chambers. According to Christina Bellantoni at TPM, the final bill that comes out of conference committee is probably going to look a lot like the more conservative Senate bill and completely eschew many of the House bill’s main features, including the public option.

Click on the link provided above for more details

December 21, 2009

In Late Night Vote, Senate Dems Score a Huge Health Care Victory

At 1:25 this morning, the Senate voted to defeat a Republican filibuster of the Democrats’ health care bill. The vote brings the Senate beyond the last big hurdle remaining for the bill and virtually guarantees that it will see final approval before the Senate leave town on Christmas Eve for recess.

To get this far, the Democratic leadership had to make dozen of concessions to their original bill to win the support of all 58 Democrats — and two Independents — in their caucus. The fact that Majority Leader Harry Reid [D, NV] and the others in the leadership managed to accommodate all [of] the conservative Democrats’ concerns with the legislation while not losing a single vote on the left by making the bill too weak is a major victory.

You can read the full Senate health care bill here and view a summary of the most recent changes, which will be officially adopted later this week, here.

The Senate now begins a series of procedural votes that is expected to take the Senate until 7 p.m. on Christmas Eve. In case you’re interested, congressional procedure expert David Waldman has posted a good, detailed rundown of what will happen between now and then. The short version, though, is that since the bill exists in the form of an amendment to a House bill, the Republicans have more opportunities than usual to obstruct, and the Democrats will have to run down the clock repeatedly on motions to defeat the filibusters. All the remaining votes until final passage (there will be 6 of them) are expected to be approved strictly along party lines with the same exact roll call results as this morning’s vote.

Click on the link provided above for more details

Here’s a summary recap of some important changes made to the Senate bill

Mitch Gurney