Grassley Says Bipartisan Health Care Talks Stalled

ABC News' Z.Byron Wolf reports: The partisanship on health care reform is on full display as members of the Senate Health Education Labor and Pensions Committee spar at a televised hearing over their health care reform proposal, written by Democrats with a public health insurance option and a requirement for employers to provide health insurance. Behind closed doors, things appear to be not going much better. The Senate Finance Committee is still hard at work trying to reach a more bipartisan compromise, but the ranking Republican on that Committee, Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said the committee may not reach a self-imposed deadline to present their bill to the public. In a conference call with Iowa reporters, Sen. Grassley said that closed-door negotiations for a bipartisan health reform bill in the Senate Finance Committee have hit a snag and an important cost estimate of that bill has been delayed as a result. But Grassley expressed optimism that the finance committee will be able to reach a bipartisan health care reform bill. Leaders on the committee have said they want to have a bill passed out of the committee before Congress leaves for a week around the July 4 holiday. “Until yesterday, we were pretty much on schedule to get a bill to the Senate floor by — by the end of this month for debate next month,” Grassley said in the conference call. “Now, that slipped yesterday. Whether it slipped a day or a week, I don't really know.”  Grassley said he and Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., were told by the director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), Douglas Elmendorf, that they would need written legislation by Wednesday or Thursday night in order to have a nonpartisan CBO cost estimate before a planned markup next Tuesday. “My answer to him was that it's probably delayed anyway for other reasons because we can't reach the compromise,” Grassley said. Grassley faulted President Obama, saying the president sounded less willing in his speech to the American Medical Association Monday to be flexible in negotiating with Republicans. He also said the finance committee continues to focus on its closed door negotiations, which include 23 Senators, on their bipartisan approach.  Grassley said only one sitting Republican Senator would even consider supporting a public health insurance option. So Democrats, he said, should work with Republicans to flesh out the co-op proposal for non-profit insurance companies to provide low-cost alternatives to the private sector. Grassley said he still shares the president’s urgency that health care reform, if it is to happen before the next presidential election, must happen this year. “If it doesn't happen, it'll happen four years from now because next year is an election year, the following year, even though it's not an election year, is the start of a presidential… season. And it's probably not going to be a part of that,” Grassley said.