After an epic and suspenseful fight in the House to pass President Obama’s health-care bill, Republican resistance to passing changes to the law through the Senate looked Wednesday like it would go down with little more than a whimper.
Republican Senate aides promised to fight to the end. But Democrats were confident that they had written what is known as a “reconciliation” bill in such a way that it would not likely be successfully challenged by Republicans.
Senate Republicans have admitted that the bill appears to be fairly well-scrubbed of measures that are not budget-related, greatly reducing the chances that the legislation will have to go back through the House for another vote.
So attention turned Wednesday afternoon to when the complicated reconciliation process — which is nonetheless important to liberal House Democrats and labor unions because of the changes being made — might be done.
Debate, which is limited to 20 hours under reconciliation rules, began on Tuesday afternoon, and was suspended that night and then picked up Wednesday morning. Democrats forfeited more than seven hours of debate to speed up the process, and by late afternoon on Wednesday formal debate had ended.
Then began the process of vote-a-rama. Under reconciliation, there is no limit on the number of amendments that can be offered. At one point when the health bill was still in the House, and the outcome of reconciliation was playing a large role in determining votes of some House Democrats, there was talk that Senate Republicans might filibuster through endless amendments.
Each amendment takes about 15 minutes total, even under the expedited rules of vote-a-rama, where there is only two minutes of debate. Four amendments easily fill up an hour.
Republicans have so far offered 18 amendments to the reconciliation bill. If each one is voted on, that would take up around five hours. More amendments were expected.
However, the record number of amendments under the process is 51, set twice, in 1995 and 2001, according to Senate Librarians. If Republicans were to approach that number of amendments, it is likely the chair of the Senate would at a certain point rule the amendments “dilatory,” or intended simply to slow down the process, and shut down amendments.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs bemoaned the amendments, saying that many of them were “intended to create a political distraction.”
“I think it’s pretty clear that there’s a lot of game-playing going on,” Gibbs said.
The amendments are almost all, however, seeking to remove to the different components of the health care law that Republicans most dislike.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, needs only 51 votes to defeat an amendment in reconciliation, and has assured the press, the White House and House Democrats that he has them.
Once amendments are finished, late Wednesday or some time Thursday, Republicans are then expected to offer challenges to different parts of the bill on the grounds that they are not budget-related and therefore what is known as the “Byrd rule,” which requires that anything in a reconciliation bill be strictly related to budgetary matters.
Senate Parliamentarian Alan Fruman has already ruled that an excise tax on high-end employer-provided “Cadillac” plans does not violate the Byrd rule, disappointing Republicans who thought that they found a viable challenge.
The GOP was tight-lipped late Wednesday about what further challenges to the bill might be.
As for other challenges to the health bill by Republican state attorney generals, who filed a case Tuesday arguing that the law’s requirement that all Americans purchase insurance is unconstitutional, the White House said Wednesday they were not concerned about the challenges.
“You’ve seen lawsuits from several of these attorneys general, that we do not believe will be successful,” Gibbs said.
The Justice Department, said spokesman Charles Miller, “will vigorously defend the constitutionality of the health care reform statute, along with any other claims, in any litigation that is brought against the United States.”
“We are confident that this statute is constitutional and we will prevail when we defend it in court,” Miller said.