Senate Republicans Block Bill That Would Delay
Medicare Physician Payment Cut
Sends it back for further negotiations between
Republicans and Democrats
June
13, 2008 - Senate Democrats on Thursday failed to obtain the 60 votes
required to invoke cloture and begin debate on a
bill (S
3101) that would delay for 18 months a 10.6% reduction in Medicare
physician fees scheduled to take effect on July 1 and increase payments
by 1.1%, among other provisions, CQ Today reports.
The Senate voted 54-39 in favor of cloture (Wayne,
CQ Today, 6/12). The bill, sponsored by
Senate Finance Committee Chair Max Baucus (D-Mont.), would cost
about $20 billion over five years (Wilde Mathews, Wall Street Journal,
6/13).
Before the cloture vote, Senate Majority Leader
Harry Reid (D-Nev.) denied a request by Republicans for a similar vote
on a competing bill (S
3118) introduced by Senate Finance Committee ranking member Chuck
Grassley (R-Iowa) (CQ Today, 6/12). Grassley's measure would cost about
$16.5 billion over five years (Wall Street Journal, 6/13).
The failed cloture vote will send the "issue back
for further negotiations between Republicans and Democrats," and the
"eventual upshot is likely to be a more narrowly crafted bill than the
one introduced" by Baucus, the Wall Street Journal reports.
However, "some aspects of the Grassley and Baucus
bills are common and are likely to survive in the Senate's final
version," the Journal reports.
One such provision is a measure that would provide
incentives for physicians to adopt electronic prescribing. According to
the Journal, "[I]t isn't clear whether Congress will make the deadline"
to delay the reduction in Medicare physician reimbursements or "attempt
to restore the higher fee levels retroactively" (Wall Street Journal,
6/13).
Absences
The cloture vote "came up short because of
Republican support for" the Grassley bill and "key absences from the
Democratic caucus,"
The Hill reports (Young, The Hill, 6/12).
According to CQ Today, in the event that five
absent Democrats had voted, the "cloture motion likely would have
succeeded." Reid changed his vote from "yes" to "no" to allow him to
hold a subsequent vote on the bill under parliamentary rules (CQ Today,
6/12).
The absent Democrats included presumptive
presidential nominee Sen.
Barack Obama (Ill.), former presidential candidate Sen. Hillary
Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) and Sen. Edward Kennedy (Mass.), who recently was
diagnosed with brain cancer (The Hill, 6/12).
However, additional votes would "have been needed
to override an expected veto," which President Bush threatened on
Thursday, CongressDaily reports (Edney, CongressDaily, 6/13).
Comments
Baucus said, "We all know what this vote was about,
and it wasn't about what's best for American seniors," adding, "The
White House doesn't want overpaid private plans in Medicare to lose a
single dime" (The Hill, 6/12).
Grassley said, "Congress has 18 days left to make
sure doctors serving Medicare patients don't get hit with a Draconian
cut that would put them in the position of not being able to serve
seniors," adding, "I hope that this failed vote will get us to the
negotiating table" (Freking,
AP/Chicago Tribune, 6/12).
