CNN: Finance Committee defeats abortion amendment
September 30, 2009
Here. We’ll see what happens when it reaches the floor. The key question is: will pro-life Democrats Bob Casey and Ben Nelson be willing to sustain a filibuster, or at least threaten to do so, if the full Senate does not pass abortion funding restrictions? Of course, another key question is exactly what restrictions pro-life Catholics should be pushing for. We’ve been discussing that here.
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I am not sure I see a dramatic difference (from the anti-abortion side) between the restriction that is already in the Baucus bill and the amendment that was defeated. In the Baucus bill, a woman can have insurance that covers abortion, and if she gets a subsidy from the government, money from that subsidy may not be used to cover abortion. If the amendment had passed, a woman could get a subsidy to help buy health insurance that did not cover abortion, but she could use her own money to buy supplemental coverage for abortion. If you feel that money is fungible, then it’s fungible in both cases. Helping someone to buy coverage without abortion, which presumably would be slightly cheaper because it covered less, would free up some of that person’s money to buy supplemental abortion coverage.
It seems to me both are mainly about bookkeeping.
I think at least some other Democrats will back the Hatch amendment on the floor – Conrad (who supported it in committee), Pryor (AR), maybe Byron Dorgan, and maybe a couple others (Tim Johnson, Mary Landrieu, maybe Harry Reid himself?). Sue Collins is the only Republican other than Snowe likely to oppose it.
What is the goal of the Hatch amendment? The current bill already prevents federal funds from being spent on abortion. Is there some concrete benefit that will come from the Hatch amendment, or do pro-lifers support it because its intention is somehow anti-abortion?
It would be a good thing if the Hatch amendment is adopted (his amendment will be in order to be offered on the floor, so he has another chance). Currently, there is no statutory prohibition of abortion as part of government health care programs. Abortion is prohibited by an annual appropriations rider renewed each year (the Hyde Amendment).
The Hyde Amendment has been passed by the Democratic Congress the past three years. And during six years of Republican control of both Congress and the White House, there was no attempt to enact a statutory prohibition of abortion.
It certainly would be a remarkable advance for the anti-abortion cause if a statutory prohibition of abortion services in government health care programs was adopted under a Democratic President and Congress when there was not even an attempt to do the same under six years of a Republican President and Congress.
Obviously, the pro-choice movement, which may have come to terms with not winning any advances for its cause in the health care bill, will go nuclear at the idea of losing ground.
This will be an interesting political battle.