Health Care’s Abortion Problem

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Doug Johnson, the legislative director of the National Right to Life Committee, sent a fascinating email to Politico’s Chris Frates on Thursday. In it, Johnson makes the case that Democrats cannot use the filibuster-proof reconciliation process to change the abortion language in the Senate’s health care bill. (As I reported last month, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s office agrees with this assessment.) Johnson also says that even if they could use reconciliation to change the abortion language, Democrats would have trouble coming to a workable compromise between the House and the Senate bills. Here’s the most important bit:

[I]f enacted, the abortion-related provisions of the Senate bill would constitute the biggest expansions of abortion ever presented to either house of Congress, for an actual floor vote, since Roe v. Wade. The Senate bill would result in direct federal funding of abortion (for example, through federally funded community Health Centers, under language added by the Reid “manager’s amendment”), federal subsidies for private abortion insurance (including plans administered by the federal government), and federal pro-abortion mandates. NRLC summarized the six or seven major abortion-related problems with the Senate-passed bill in a three-page letter to U.S. House members that is posted here: http://www.nrlc.org/AHC/HouseLetteronAbortionProvisions.html

NRLC and our 50 state affiliates have spent the last six weeks educating House members about these issues. A substantial number of pro-life Democrats in the House, including some Members not mentioned on the various published lists, have made it clear that they are not going to vote for the Senate-passed bill, with or without a “sidecar” reconciliation bill, because of the abortion problems (and, in some cases, because of other problems).

Johnson is directly challenging what Nancy Pelosi and other top House Democrats have been saying—that abortion isn’t a substantial obstacle to passing the Senate bill through the House. When Pelosi met with liberal columnists late last month, she pointedly did not include abortion on a long list of potential bill-killers. Johnson is saying, “you’re wrong—we’ve made sure this issue will kill the bill.” They can’t both be right—either Pelosi will find enough pro-life Democrats who will prioritize the health care bill over abortion politics, or she won’t.

Most of the staffers I’ve talked to about this don’t think NLRC and Rep. Bart Stupak (the sponsor of the House bill’s anti-abortion provision) have a big block of Democrats ready to switch their votes and oppose the bill. But the margin for original passage was small, and unless Pelosi can find some no-votes who will switch to yes, just a couple yes-to-nos would be enough to sink health care reform.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate