Senate Finance Committee Clears HealthCare Reform Bill

The Senate Finance Committee voted 14-9 in support of a bill that would require Americans to have health insurance, provide federal subsidies to help low-income workers buy insurance, establish new insurance marketplaces, regulate health insurer practices and expand Medicaid. The plan as drafted is estimated to cost $829 billion over the next 10 years.

Just one Republican, Sen. Olympia J. Snowe of Maine, voted for the bill, a victory for the White House, which had heavily courted Snowe. “Is this bill all that I would want? Far from it,” Snowe said in announcing her vote. “But when history calls, history calls.”

“This is our opportunity to make history,” said Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.). “Now is the time to get this done.” “This bill is not perfect, and we have significant work ahead of us,” President Obama said in a statement delivered in the Rose Garden of the White House this evening. “But I do believe the work of the Senate Finance Committee has brought us significantly closer to achieving the core objectives I laid out in September.”

The bill will cover more of the uninsured and improve coverage for those who have it, he said, “and it will not add a penny to the deficit.”

No related posts.