A top House progressive, in a statement sent my way, ripped the Dem leadership’s emerging plan to skip the traditional process to merge the House and Senate bills, claiming it will make it even tougher to improve the bill and slamming it for stifling real debate.
The statement is the Caucus’ reaction to reports that the health-care bill will not be subject to a formal conference process, but will undergo final negotiations largely behind closed doors- a move that’s garnering criticism from transparency and good-government advocates as well as ideologues on both sides:
Recently adopted and long standing House and Senate rules require conference committees to be generally open to the public. Both House and Senate rules require that all conference committee meetings be open to the public unless a majority of conferees votes in open session to close the meetings. Senate rules require all conference committee reports be publicly available for at least 48 hours prior to a final vote. Without conference, there is no mechanism to provide for openness in the final discussions regarding the health care bill. Other conference rules provide for openness within the conference committee rather than public openness. These provisions require that conference committees not exclude conferees from decisions or refuse them the ability to see documents or participate in meetings. It will be much easier to exclude potentially difficult members (coming from both the left and right) without a formal conference.
Grumbling from liberals, of course, is likely just a prelude to support for the plan no matter what it looks like in the end, but they’re worth keeping an eye on. Pelosi needs progressive support, and they’re already furious about the Senate version of the bill having a mandate with no public option, and various other compromises they’re being forced to swallow.
