Progressives To Reid: Hold Firm On Public Option (VIDEO)

Reported by Huffington Post on Tuesday, 17 November 2009 (on November 17, 2009)

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid met on Monday night with a group of Senate Democrats who urged him not to back down from his decision to put a public option in health care legislation.

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) requested the meeting, saying that progressive lawmakers had concluded that they had compromised enough.

\"Most of us in the caucus want a strong public option, support the Reid way of doing it,\" he told the New York Times. \"And we\'re confident that over time, as the debate unfolds and we take amendment after amendment after amendment, that we can get 60 votes.\"

\"We figure on the public option there has been a lot of compromise already,\" he said. \"...A large number of people in this country including many, many doctors wanted Medicare for all. That didn\'t happen. Then we wanted a strong public option tied to Medicare rates. Then we wanted a public option building the Medicare network. That didn\'t happen. Now we are saying public option coming out of the HELP Committee. And now we\'re saying public option with the state opt-out. Where was the compromise coming from their side?\"

Sherrod Brown also discussed his position on \"The Rachel Maddow Show\" Monday night. He backed Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), who said recently that the Democrats would force Republicans trying to delay the bill to stay in 24-hour sessions. \"Whatever it takes,\" he said.

Asked about Sen. Joe Lieberman\'s (I-Conn.) threat to filibuster the bill, Brown reiterated that the majority of Democrats backed the public option. \"We\'re not gonna let the tail wag the dog here,\" he said. He added that he was confident that in the end, reluctant Democrats would let the public option go to an up-or-down vote. He also said he was sure Harry Reid would not put an amendment restricting abortion coverage in the Senate bill.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Get HuffPost Politics On Facebook and Twitter!

Links:

Full news story

Post this:

Facebook

E-mail

Twitter

Mixx

StumbleUpon

FriendFeed

Recent related news

Huffington Post 13 hours ago - Politics	Jane Hamsher: Fact Sheet: The Truth About the Health Care Bill The Firedoglake health care team has been covering the debate in congress since it began last year....
Huffington Post 15 hours ago - Business	Ellen Brown: The Growing Movement for Publicly-Owned Banks As the states\' credit crisis deepens, four states have initiated bills for state-owned banks, and...
Huffington Post 15 hours ago - Politics	Robert Creamer: An Historic Sunday: March 21, 2010 Sunday, March 21st, 2010. Remember that date. I have been involved in progressive politics for over...
Huffington Post 2 days ago - Politics	Norman Solomon: Zero Public Option + One Mandate = Disaster Not long ago, the most prominent supporters of the public option were touting it as essential for...
Huffington Post 2 days ago - Politics	Mitch Rofsky: Do We Need to Break up California to Fix Democracy? Many Democrats are recognizing that the federal government is broken and are lining up to \"fix\" the...

Huffington Post 3 days ago - World	Johann Hari: Kidnapped, Raped, Married: The Extraordinary Rebellion of Ethiopia's Abducted Wives Every woman remembers her wedding day with a tear in her eye - but, here in Ethiopia, the tears are...
Huffington Post 4 days ago - Politics	Daniel Cluchey: Bill Halter Vs. The Bill Halter What\'s in a name? \"Blue Dog\" Democrats, those lovable centrist congresspeople who recently brought...
Huffington Post 4 days ago - Technology	Arianna Huffington: "Dotcom" Turns 25: My Predictions for What Comes Next Yesterday marked the 25th anniversary of the Internet designation \".com.\" To commemorate the...
Huffington Post 4 days ago - Politics	Robert Creamer: Top 10 Reasons Why Voting Yes on Health Care Reform is Good Politics for Democrats Reason # 10 -- Consider the source. Who are the major advocates of the theory that it is bad politics...
Huffington Post 4 days ago - Politics	Closing Pro-Reform Ad Has Private Insurers On Corporate Jets, High-Fiving (VIDEO) Two pro-health care reform groups are launching a \"closing argument\" television ad campaign in...

Tweet the News!			62
Progressives To Reid: Hold Firm On Public Option (VIDEO)
Twitter login: password: Register to store your twitter account details
There don't appear to be any related tweets. Be the first to tweet the news!

Tip: Sign up as a Member now - FREE access to news alerts, news bookmarking and more.

Select Region >