House Democratic leaders yesterday abandoned a long struggle to strike a compromise on abortion in their ranks, gambling that they can secure the support for President Obama's sweeping health-care legislation with showdown votes looming as early as next week.
In doing so, they are all but counting out a small but potentially decisive group whose views on abortion coverage have become the principal hang-up for Democrats fighting to pass the overhaul. Congressional leaders are hoping they can find enough support from other wavering Democrats to pass legislation that only cleared the House by five votes in an earlier incarnation.
The concession came as House Democrats attended a lengthy meeting with White House health adviser Nancy Ann DeParle, who tried to answer questions, resolve differences and calm nerves, especially for legislators expecting tough challenges in November. Participants said they generally embraced White House-brokered compromises on prescription-drug benefits for the elderly and new taxes on generous insurance plans.
At stake is Obama's call to expand health coverage to about 30 million people who lack insurance and to prohibit such insurance-company practices as denying coverage to people who have been sick. Most Americans would be required by law to get health insurance.
Republicans continued their fierce criticisms of the president's efforts, vowing to make Democrats pay dearly in the fall elections if they don't back off from what they brand a government takeover of health care. But senior Democrats predicted that they can convince their colleagues that doing nothing is the worst option of all, politically and substantively.
"The stars are aligning for victory on comprehensive health reform," said Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa.
The White House chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, emerged from a meeting in the Capitol with top Democratic legislators last night saying: "We made a lot of decisions. We're getting towards the end."
The end might be near, but the outcome remains uncertain. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., must round up at least 216 votes when the real nose-counting and arm-twisting begin in a few days, after final cost estimates arrive from the Congressional Budget Office. All House and Senate Republicans have vowed to oppose the legislation.
With Senate Democrats no longer able to block Republican filibusters, the strategy calls for House Democrats to embrace a health bill that the Senate passed in December, despite many objections. Democratic senators in turn would promise to make a limited number of changes under "budget-reconciliation" rules, which bar filibusters.
Obama tried to soothe the feelings of two generally liberal constituencies -- Congress's black and Hispanic caucuses -- in separate White House meetings yesterday. Some black legislators say that the health legislation doesn't do enough to help poor people. Many Hispanic members say that it mistreats illegal immigrants trying to buy insurance with their own money.
One of the toughest hurdles facing Pelosi involves abortion. Some anti-abortion Democrats say that the Senate language is not sufficiently airtight to prevent taxpayer dollars from mingling with money that might be used to subsidize abortions.
Others disagree, and party leaders acknowledged yesterday that they can't resolve the dispute using budget-reconciliation rules.
Instead, they hope that only a few House Democrats who voted for the health-care package in November will now switch to "no" because of the abortion issue.
Party leaders think they can offset those defections by persuading some of the 39 House Democrats who voted "no" last year to switch to "yes."
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