Read the Bill! What Bill?

Michael Franc / September 23, 2009

Live from the Senate Finance Committee Mark-up

During the Senate Finance Committee mark up of the Baucus health bill today Senator Bunning of Kentucky put forth an innovative amendment. This amendment stipulated that before voting on the measure in Committee, legislative language would have to be accessible to the public for 72 hours and that the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) would need to publish an official tally of how much this bill will cost the American people and what the real impact will be on health costs.

There are several key points to the importance of this amendment that have to be highlighted:

1. What the Finance Committee is debating and amending is a 220-page conceptual outline of policy changes that will not be translated into actual legislative language until after the committee finishes debating and voting on amendments to this conceptual document. (more…)