Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) - President Barack Obama is still hoping for a bipartisan health care reform bill, but will support whatever it takes--including using he so-called "reconciliation" process to circumvent the Senate's 60-vote rule--to get a health care package through Congress, said White House Senior Adviser David Axelrod.
CNSNews.com asked Axelrod if the president would support using the Senate procedure that would require only a simple majority of 51 votes to pass health care reform legislation. Normally it takes 60 votes to pass controversial legislation in the Senate--the number needed for a cloture vote to end Senate debate on an issue.
“He has probably spent more time talking to people in both parties on this than any president has on a major issue,” Axelrod told CNSNews.com Wednesday after Obama’s prime time address to a joint session of Congress.
“But I also think at the end of the day this is not just a matter of process. It’s a matter of progress,” Axelrod continued. “And it’s enormously important that we get something done -- and we’ll get it done, and we’ll do what the situation requires.”
The Senate tactic, known as “reconciliation,” is designed to get around the filibuster – the minority party’s longstanding method of blocking legislation it opposes. (See previous story)
Reconciliation is an option that was created in the 1974 Congressional Budget Act to give Congress a way out of long budget battles. Republicans used the procedure in 2001, 2003 and 2005 to pass tax cuts and avoid a filibuster by Senate Democrats.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) recently told a town hall meeting in Waldorf, Md. that using reconciliation is what democracy demands. (See previous story)
“The fact of the matter is that there is a reconciliation process, and the reconciliation process does provide for a majority of the United States Senate to pass the health care bill,” Hoyer said. “It so happens, as you know, the majority of the Senate are Democrats, So, under the rules of the United States Senate they can pass legislation with a majority. That’s not ramming something through with a majority. It is doing what democracy calls for.”
A new Gallup Poll shows that just 37 percent of Americans want their member of Congress to vote for the Democrats’ pending health care reform bill.