WASHINGTON — Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, a key Republican negotiator on health care proposals, said Wednesday that the angry protests at town hall meetings this month have fundamentally altered the debate and convinced him that lawmakers should consider drastically scaling back the scope of the effort.
After hearing from protesters at meetings across Iowa, Grassley said he has concluded that the public has rejected the far-reaching proposals Democrats have put on the table, viewing them as overly expensive precursors to “a government takeover of health care.”
Grassley said he remains hopeful that he and five other members of the Senate Finance Committee can draft a better, less costly plan capable of winning broad support from Democrats and Republicans.
But as the group, known as the Gang of Six, prepared to continue talking via teleconference, Grassley said the members may be forced to reassess the breadth of their efforts in light of public concerns.
“Not just on health care, but on a lot of other things Congress has done this year, people are signaling that we ought to slow up and find out where we are and don't spend so much money and don't get us so far into debt,” Grassley said in a telephone interview between stops in Iowa Falls and Ames.
The Finance Committee group is still discussing a “comprehensive” plan for extending health coverage to millions of uninsured families, he said, but revisiting that approach would be “a natural outcome of what people may be getting from the town hall meetings.”
On Wednesday, Grassley made clear that he remains committed to pursuing a health care bill, provided it does not “make things worse” for people who are happy with their insurance or add to swollen budget deficits.
Top Democrats say they are increasingly convinced that there is little chance that any health care bill will win broad GOP support. They have not, however, stepped up preparations to draft a Democratic bill or to use a procedural maneuver known as reconciliation that would permit them to push a measure through the Senate with a simple majority of 51 votes rather than the filibuster-proof 60.
“The White House and the Senate Democratic leadership still prefer a bipartisan bill,” said Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. “However, patience is not unlimited and we are determined to get something done this year by any legislative means necessary.”
Administration officials on Wednesday sought to tamp down the fires, with White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs assuring reporters that the “president believes strongly in working with Republicans and Democrats.”
