Boxer: Senate Has Votes To Block Stupak Amendment
by Sam Stein
[Boxer]
Senator Barbara Boxer
One of Congress's foremost champions of abortion rights said on
Monday that the Senate did not have the votes to add a more restrictive
anti-abortion amendment to health care reform legislation.
Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said that 60 votes would be needed to
strip the current health care bill of its abortion-related language and
replace it with a version resembling that passed by the House of
Representatives on Saturday. And, in an interview with the Huffington
Post, the California Democrat predicted that pro-choice forces in the
Senate would keep that from happening.
"If someone wants to offer this very radical amendment, which would
really tear apart [a decades-long] compromise, then I think at that
point they would need to have 60 votes to do it," Boxer said. "And I
believe in our Senate we can hold it."
"It is a much more pro-choice Senate than it has been in a long time,"
she added. "And it is much more pro-choice than the House."
Boxer's reading of the political landscape might seem like the hopeful
spin of an abortion-rights defender. But it was seconded by a far less
pro-choice lawmaker, Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.)
"It would have to be added," sad the Montana Democrat of an amendment
that mirrored that offered Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) in the House. "I
doubt it could pass."
Speaking days after House Democrats helped pass the Stupak provision --
which would greatly restrict private insurers from covering abortion --
Boxer and Baucus's proclamations are undoubtedly music to the ears of
pro-choice activists. President Obama, likewise, stressed during an
interview with ABC News Monday night
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/09/gibbs-wont-offer-position_n_35\
1064.html> that he would like to see the Stupak amendment changed
before a final version of health care legislation is produced.
In making her argument, Boxer described the provision as inherently
prejudiced, as well as bad policy and unfair politics. The Stupak
amendment, she said, would deny women access to "a legal medical
procedure" even if she agrees to pay for it with private funds (a
supplemental policy would have to be purchased to cover abortion).
"It's bad enough on the first count, but on the second count it seems to
me very unfair and very discriminatory," she said. "I don't see them
picking out anything that a man relies on, any kind of procedure that a
man relies on. This is very discriminatory towards women."
She noted that it was predominantly men who were making these policy
decisions.
"In all my years in politics, this is what it's been like," Boxer said.
"This is the way it is. It always amazes me. The leading voices always,
since I've been in Congress, have always been males. And that is one of
the reasons why I think it is so important to have more women. Not that
every woman is pro-choice. It is not true. But most of the women are."
"And so when I see man after man come down there I just feel, in my
heart our of hearts: Why don't you trust women to make this decision? We
are deserving of your trust," the senator added.
Currently, the Senate bill's language would allow for insurers
participating in a health care exchange to cover abortions so long as
they ensured that federal funds are not used to pay for the procedure.
An amendment similar to Stupaks' effort -- which was offered by Senator
Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) -- had already been voted down in the Senate
Finance Committee.
To re-introduce such a provision, Boxer said, 60 senators would be
required to cut off debate on the floor. And the votes for that, she
said, likely won't materialize.
"If they try to add the language we would try to stop them," she said.
"If somebody wants to take it out they are going to need 60 votes to
take it out... And my view is that we do have the numbers."
Boxer is slated to meet on Tuesday with Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.)
as well as other Democratic women in the Senate to discuss the topic of
abortion vis-à-vis health care reform.
"When we sat down to do health care, I thought there was an
understanding that we would be abortion-neutral," she said. "In other
words we wouldn't change anything on abortion; that federal funds
couldn't be used but of course private funds could as long as this was
legal. And Roe v. Wade is the law of the land."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/10/boxer-senate-has-votes-to_n_352\
064.html
