WASHINGTON UPDATE

President Obama has called on the House and Senate to have an up or down vote on the comprehensive health reform bills already on the table within the next few weeks.”  While President Obama never used the words “budget reconciliation” in his remarks, he and the members of his administration, as well as Democratic congressional leaders, appear to have endorsed the budget reconciliation strategy to pass the legislation. They appear to have abandoned the idea of passing a reconciliation bill first. This bill would include all of the changes to the Senate bill that have been negotiated. Instead, Democratic leaders appear to have agreed to attempt to have the House pass the original Senate bill verbatim first, then move forward with fixing what they can through reconciliation.  Politically, the process is fraught with peril. President Obama has also called for an extremely aggressive timeline for this course of action, hoping to have the whole matter wrapped up before Congress leaves for Easter break in three weeks, with the House voting on the original Senate-passed legislation by March 18 before the president leaves for a trip to Asia. He’s also begun aggressively courting House Democrats for their votes. Speaker Pelosi and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer both stated that the Obama time frame may be unrealistic, and that they will not necessarily rush a vote before Easter.

The process being finalized by the White House and House and congressional leadership would work, in theory, along these lines: Democratic House and Senate leadership negotiate reconciliation language to make the Senate-passed legislation acceptable to members of the House of Representatives. This draft legislation is sent to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to receive a “score” and then released to the public. The Senate-passed legislation (H.R. 3590), as it currently stands, which means the version passed on December 24, 2009 is passed by the House of Representatives verbatim. President Obama signs the original version of the Senate Bill into law. Senate Finance Committee reports out the reconciliation bill that includes the negotiated language to change the Senate-passed bill. What the committee will be able to send to the floor are just changes allowable under the budget reconciliation rules. When the Senate majority leader calls up the reconciliation fix bill, the clock starts ticking on 20 hours of total debate time. During the 20 hours, points of order can be raised against provisions that only make policy and don’t have any budget effect (meaning that many of the changes House Democrats want, like the abortion language, could be stricken). The presiding officer, which could be the vice president, makes these rulings. If the VP wants to control the rulings in the favor of the White House, he can overlook certain rulings. It takes 60 senators to overturn a ruling by the presiding officer. After the 20 hours of debate, senators can still offer amendments and demand a vote. This process has been dubbed vote-a-rama and, in past cases, several hundred amendments have been filed and vote-a-ramas have delayed the final passage vote for days. But final passage requires only a majority vote, so nine Democrats could vote against final passage and the vice president would break the tie. House takes up and passes reconciliation bill without amendments. Speaker Pelosi sends the bill to White House for signature. Problems and complications with this strategy/timeline: The House may not pass the Senate bill. The negotiated reconciliation bill procedurally cannot include many of the policy-related items House Democratic leaders insist they need to feel comfortable with the Senate-passed legislation, nor could it include many of the bipartisan changes President Obama endorsed. The Senate doesn’t have to approve the reconciliation bill. CBO may not be able to score provisions in the negotiated fix reconciliation bill until the House passes the Senate bill, as the score needs to be based on current law, not hypothetical law. The Senate Finance Committee must approve a reconciliation bill. There is a 13/10 ratio of Democrats to Republicans, and since it takes a majority vote to report a bill, Democrats can only lose two votes.

COBRA Subsidy Extension Legislation to extend the federal subsidy of COBRA premiums temporarily, H. R. 4691, was passed by the House of Representatives on February 25, by the Senate on March 2 and immediately signed into law by President Obama. The new law extends the COBRA subsidy eligibility period to March 31, 2010, from its previous expiration date of February 28. This measure also creates a new class of eligible individuals for the subsidy. It provides COBRA and subsidy eligibility for those employees who first lost health plan coverage due to a reduction in hours and then were involuntarily terminated after the date of the act’s effective date. The involuntary termination of employment for those employees who were previously covered but lost coverage due to a reduction in hours is now a qualifying event, and that reduction of hours is now the start of a person’s COBRA coverage eligibility, not the involuntary termination. Notices will have to be provided to eligible individuals within 60 days of the date of involuntary termination date with information regarding this extension and special COBRA enrollment period. The length of the subsidy remains at 15 months. In addition to this temporary extension, it is expected that Congress will consider a longer-term extension (possibly up to December 31, 2010) within the next month.