House Democrats to open hearings on health bill
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House Democrats are pushing forward with a partisan health care bill even as a key Senate Democrat labors to achieve an elusive bipartisan compromise on President Barack Obama's top legislative priority.
The action on both sides of the Capitol comes with lawmakers mindful of next week's July 4 congressional recess. Most will return home to face constituents with plenty of questions about their plans to overhaul the nation's costly health care system.
A sweeping bill unveiled in the Democratic-controlled House last week is to be weighed in hearings beginning Tuesday. The draft legislation, written without Republican help, would require all Americans to purchase health insurance and would put new requirements on employers, too.
Meanwhile, delays continued in the slower-moving Senate, as the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee jettisoned an end-of-week deadline for passing its bill.
"We won't get the whole bill done" before the July 4 recess, Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., acknowledged Monday after an afternoon spent working on prevention issues. The most contentious portions remained incomplete — those dealing with the introduction of a new public plan to compete with private insurers, and what requirements employers will face to provide care to their workers.