Don’t look now, but Democrats are about to abandon their commitment to a public plan option, if they haven’t already done so.
In every public appearance, President Barack Obama continues to push the public plan option as an essential element of any healthcare reform legislation. But, from the White House, different signals are being given.
For the second day in a row yesterday, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters the president was open to all options for providing more choice and more competition, including the insurance cooperatives proposed by the Senate Finance Committee. In fact, Gibbs told NBC’s Chuck Todd that at this point the president had “no preference” between the co-ops and the public plan option.
No preference? That’s a long way from the full-throated endorsement of the public plan option we’ve heard from President Obama on the stump.
What’s going on? I think it’s pretty clear what’s going on: The White House is laying the groundwork for dumping the public plan option in order to win a few Republican votes for healthcare.
If so, it’s a total betrayal of what the president’s been talking about. Regional, nonprofit insurance co-ops may be a good idea, and they have worked in some rural parts of the country, but they’re no substitute for a national, Medicare-like, affordable public plan option that would make health insurance instantly available to all who can’t afford it.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) says Republicans will never vote for healthcare legislation that includes a public plan option. It’s time for President Obama to say he will never sign a healthcare bill without one.
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