Republicans keeping August heat on in September

Republicans hoping to continue their efforts to win public support against a public plan in health care reform pledge to keep their steam in September while Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley's position on the public option is assailed by liberals.

Politico: "For congressional Republicans, July was all about hoping the summer recess would come before the Democrats could pass a health care bill. August, says (Georgia Republican Rep. Jack) Kingston, was about having 'as many town hall meetings as possible in order to educate the public, to keep this momentum up.' Now it's September, and the focus will shift back to Washington, where House Democrats are awaiting action from the Senate while trying to reconcile three competing bills of their own" (Libit, 9/1).

Steele reiterated his pledge to ABC News to not support Medicare benefit cuts but "acknowledged that he and other Republicans do support finding savings in Medicare as part of broader entitlement reform. 'You've got to deal with those inefficiencies, absolutely,' he said" (Klein, 8/31).

The Associated Press in the meantime is reporting that Grassley hopes limited reforms can pass, but reiterated his own pledge that a government-run public option won't be part of the Senate Finance Committee package. He also told teh AP that he is "still hopeful" but this feeling is based on an expectation that reforms will be "a little less sweeping than what we talked about before." Through August, Grassley has been critical of public option, "but went a step further Monday in saying the core group of senators agreed such a provision would not be in a bill. 'It's pretty clear that's something not on the table,' Grassley said. 'It's fair to say that not every one of the six is opposed to it, but they realize the reality of it.' … He declined to be precise about what he could accept" (Glover, 8/31).

The Christian Science Monitor has more on Grassley: "An August fundraising letter by Sen. Charles Grassley (R) of Iowa, which has just entered Washington's radar, asks for support in helping him defeat 'Obama-care.' He likens that to the more liberal versions of reform that have passed panels in the House and Senate, not what he has been working on in his committee. But the language in his letter is so harsh that it seems close to shutting the door on negotiations with Democrats. 'The simple truth is that I am and always have been opposed to the Obama administration's plans to nationalize healthcare,' says the letter, a fundraising appeal for Senator Grassley's reelection bid that could include a challenge in the GOP primary" (Feldmann, 8/31).

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This article was reprinted from khn.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.