MoveOn ‘Likely’ to Target Conrad in Television Ad

ABC News' Teddy Davis reports: MoveOn.org, the liberal advocacy group, is “likely” to launch a television ad targeting Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., for voting yesterday against not only Sen. Jay Rockefeller’s, D-W.Va., public option amendment but also Sen. Chuck Schumer’s, D-N.Y., more moderate version. The planned television ad against Conrad comes on the heels of MoveOn’s announcement earlier today that it is launching radio ads targeting Conrad and the two other Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee – Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont. – who voted against the Schumer and Rockefeller amendments. Why the inclination to go against Conrad on television rather than all three conservative Democrats? “Kent Conrad has singularly been obstructing an honest debate on health care by repeating Republican talking points and steadfastly opposing a public health insurance option which most Americans believe is the heart of true health care reform,” Ilyse Hogue, MoveOn’s director of political advocacy and communications, told ABC News. “He's out of step and needs to be held accountable,” she added. The radio ads launched Wednesday accuse the three senators of siding with “the special interests and insurance companies” instead of the people of their states. The radio ads are airing in the senators’ respective states of North Dakota, Arkansas, and Montana. Listen to the ads HERE.  Under the defeated Rockefeller amendment, the public option would have dictated Medicare reimbursement rates to health-care providers. Under the defeated Schumer amendment, the public option would negotiate reimbursement rates with health-care providers the way private insurance companies do now. The Rockefeller amendment held the promise of saving the government more money; the Schumer amendment held the promise of being more amenable to health-care providers who complain that Medicare’s below-market reimbursement rates are inadequate.
Asked why he is against not only Rockefeller’s public option amendment but also Schumer’s more moderate version which avoids the below-market Medicare reimbursement rates which North Dakota hospitals worry about, Conrad said in a statement: “The public option has become one of the most divisive issues in health reform. And despite its virtues, the public option simply cannot get the 60 votes needed to pass the Senate. Its inclusion could doom the larger health reform effort and undermine everything we’ve been working for.”