Reid Plan STILL Requires Monthly Abortion Fee

Like I said earlier today, Ben Nelson proved he could be bought like the cheapest trick on the corner.

The sellout was all for nothing, as House Minority Leader John Boehner says the "Dingy" Harry bill still requires a monthly abortion fee.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-NV) latest health care “manager’s amendment” would STILL levy a new “abortion premium” fee on Americans under the Democrats’ health care plan. Just like the original 2,032-page, government-run health care plan from Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) and the last version of Senator Reid’s 2,074-page bill, this latest 383-page amendment levies an abortion premium and does not fix the problem of government funds being used to subsidize elective abortions.

Under Reid’s “manager’s amendment,” there is no prohibition on abortion coverage in federally subsidized plans participating in the Exchange. Instead the amendment includes layers of accounting gimmicks that demand that plans participating in the Exchange or the new government-run plan that will be managed by the Office of Personnel Management must establish “allocation accounts” when elective abortion is a covered benefit (p. 41). Everyone enrolled in these plans must pay a monthly abortion premium (p. 41, lines 5-8), and these funds will be used to pay for the elective abortion services. The Reid amendment directs insurance companies to assess the cost of elective abortion coverage (p. 43), and charge a minimum of $1 per enrollee per month (p. 43, lines 20-22).

In short, the Reid bill continues to defy the will of the American people and contradict longstanding federal policy by providing federal subsidies to private health plans that cover elective abortions. The new language does include a “state opt-out” provision if a state passes a law to prohibit insurance coverage of abortion, but it’s a sham because it does nothing to prevent one state’s tax dollars from paying for elective abortions in other states.

Kathryn Jean Lopez writes at NRO that Nebraska Right To Life is saying Ben Nelson betrayed them:

"Senator Nelson had a chance to ensure that the longstanding principle of the Hyde Amendment against federal funding of abortion with narrow exceptions, would be placed in the Senate healthcare legislation. He dashed any hope of that with his late-night agreement with Senators Reid, Boxer and Schumer on unacceptable language that he claimed would address pro-life concerns." said Julie Schmit-Albin, Executive Director of Nebraska Right to Life (NRL).

"Senator Nelson and his Chief of Staff, Tim Becker, called me last night at 7:30 p.m. Central time as a matter of 'courtesy', to let me know that he was pitching alternative language to Democratic leadership. We spoke for about 40 minutes." said Schmit-Albin. "When I asked them at the outset of the conversation to include National Right to Life in the call they declined and said they were going with the language. Senator Nelson claimed that their newly-drafted concepts/language was Stupak-plus and that it would pass pro-life muster. When I countered that we had no assurance of that because we were not allowed to review the language, I was reminded that this was merely a courtesy call, not a call for our input or approval."

"There is no pro-life Nebraskan more devastated by Senator Nelson's actions than myself." said Schmit-Albin. "I have defended his record to Nebraskans and believed that he would stand on pro-life principles as he has on numerous occasions in the past. I have had a good relationship with Senator Nelson and his staff throughout the years. I personally met with him on healthcare in July and in mid-November and have been in frequent contact with his staff over the past six weeks. Just Wednesday afternoon, I was apprised of the Casey language by his staff and I urged them to strongly relay to him that we could not support it. When he rejected the Casey language we were bolstered by that action and believed he would hold firm to his commitment to vote against cloture if Stupak language was not included."

"Moreover, NRL Political Action Committee gave Senator Nelson a sole endorsement in his re-election race in 2006 based on his record and actions both as Governor and Senator." said Schmit-Albin. "It is a very sobering day for myself personally and for pro-lifers across Nebraska and the nation. Senator Nelson obliterated the hope of pro-life Americans who saw him as the last man standing between expansion of government funding of abortion and the Hyde Amendment."

"Nebraska Right to Life follows the lead of National Right to Life in opposing the passage of healthcare legislation containing such bogus abortion language and looks forward to NRLC 's scoring of all cloture votes on the issue." said Schmit-Albin.

Unfortunately, NRLC learned the hard lesson that there is not such thing as a pro-life Democrat, just like there's no such thing as a conservative Democrat. They all need to be thrown out on their asses at election time. Ben Nelson is another example of how you cannot trust a Democrat in elected office, because they put Party First, before their constituents who elected them, and the Country.