After months of negotiations, the Senate Finance Committee approved its health-care reform bill on Tuesday. The sharp partisan split — Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, was the only Republican who voted for the bill — is not surprising, because arguments for and against health-care reform have fallen along partisan lines. What is surprising, and disappointing, is the lack of support from Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa. His work and influence on the committee’s deliberations have been instrumental in forcing key compromises.
His own lack of compromise, however, is disheartening.
Grassley previously objected to a public health-insurance option, which would be a government-run plan similar to Medicare. The Iowa senator was not alone in his objections. Most Republicans and some Democrats also objected to the public option. Eventually, the Finance Committee scrapped it in favor of nonprofit, health-care cooperatives. Grassley embraced the cooperatives early on and championed them as an alternative to the public option. The public option was the most important element for many Democrats, and his support of the compromise gave hope to the idea that Congress could pass a bipartisan bill.
Unfortunately, he eschewed bipartisanship with a “no” vote on Tuesday. Perhaps it was foolish to expect the senator to stray from the party line and vote for the measure. He said earlier this year he would not support the bill if he could not find at least three Republicans who would also support it.
Partisanship appears to be the reason Grassley voted against the bill, but it was not one of the reasons he listed in a statement. Instead, he pointed to alleged increases in taxes and insurance premiums, as well as lax regulations for illegal immigrants seeking coverage.
He contended that the bill would “further the new federal rating bands for insurance rates. That means that millions who are expecting lower costs as a result of health reform will end up paying more in the form of higher premiums.” He did not elaborate as to how it would increase premiums. If anything, tightening regulations on rating bands would prevent insurance companies from raising rates on insured individuals without classifying them as different risks.
Congress will most likely have to raise taxes in order to provide affordable coverage. But Grassley didn’t include in his complaint the tax credit low- and middle-class people would receive when purchasing insurance in the gateway, a government-regulated, health-care marketplace.
Consequently, he is wrong to fear that middle- and lower-income people would be burdened under the proposal.
Perhaps Grassley’s most erroneous fear is that illegal immigrants could receive benefits under the bill. The idea itself is preposterous. Wording in the legislation specifically excludes undocumented immigrants. The bill does not provide free health care, but allows people to purchase health care from the exchange. Individuals would have to file for a tax credit in order to receive a reimbursement. Undocumented immigrants couldn’t possibly file for the tax credit, because they do not pay income taxes.
America has a vast partisan schism, and it is a nation in which millions of its citizens are without health insurance. The nation, and particularly Iowa, is crying out for bipartisanship. A recent Des Moines Register poll showed 52 percent of Iowans favored Grassley compromising with Democrats on health-care reform.
Perhaps he should listen to his constituents rather than Republican ideologues.
