Moderates Give, Take In Dems’ New Quest For 60

Senate Democrats, fresh off of their Saturday win in pushing forward debate on their version of health care legislation, are beginning a new lobbying push for a new round of support from key moderates.

With Saturday’s successful vote to continue debate on Harry Reid’s reform bill  Democrats face a new test to secure the coveted 60 votes to lock out any Republican filibuster attempts. As it was this weekend, a handful of moderates likely hold the key as to whether reform moves forward past a post-Thanksgiving vote in the Senate.

The New York Times reports on intense efforts from Majority Leader Reid and the White House to get the entire Maine delegation on board with tweak to the Reid bill. Moderate Republicans Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe had been important pieces to the Dems’ bipartisan puzzle on reform, but had dropped out in the rush to get the 60 needed to push ahead with lagging legislative efforts. Both Collins and Snowe went with the rest of the GOP and voted against moving the Reid bill forward for more debate.

But comments from the two Maine senators show they are still interested in working on a health care compromise, and renewed lobbying by Democrats could produce results if changes are made to the bill, perhaps securing the bipartisan  support the president had promised while at the same time erecting a firewall in case conservative Democrats like Ben Nelson bail out of the finished product.

Anxious that Saturday’s party-line Senate vote to open debate on a health care overhaul gives them little maneuvering room, Obama administration officials and their Congressional allies are stepping up overtures to select Senate Republicans in hopes of winning their ultimate support.

The two moderate Republican senators from Maine, Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe, say Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, reached out to them after he unveiled the Senate measure, encouraging them to bring forward their ideas and concerns.

Ms. Collins also received a personal visit from a high-level Obama emissary, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, a former senator who worked closely with her on various issues as part of a bipartisan coalition.

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Unlike most Senate Republicans, who dug in deeply against the health bill as it survived the crucial preliminary vote, Ms. Snowe and Ms. Collins have left themselves open to considering a vote for some version of the overhaul if they can win significant changes during a Senate debate that is expected to last for weeks.

“I have ruled out voting for this bill, but I still very much want to vote for a bill and that is why I am continuing to have discussions,” Ms. Collins said. “I still cling to the belief that it is possible for a group of us to come together and rewrite the bill in a way that would cause it to have greater support.”

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Although Ms. Snowe and Ms. Collins both adhered to the party line when they voted Saturday, when they spoke on the Senate floor beforehand they stayed aloof from the assaults on the measure by other Republicans.

Both senators have talked privately with Democrats and independents about devising joint amendments on areas like cost control, and both said they would keep seeking compromises. Ms. Snowe said that would “be a true test of whether there is a will to improve this legislation in a nonideological, bipartisan manner.”

As for Nelson, the Nebraska moderate who has made the most noise among Democrats in criticizing aspects of the Reid bill, he told ABC on Sunday that he would back up his earlier threats to withhold support for the Senate legislation as it stands and vote against cloture the next time the bill hit the Senate floor unless it is “improved.”

But when I saw the bill, I said, “This can be amended. It can be improved.” And the — the debate should begin, and ought not to stop the opportunity to improve the bill when it… STEPHANOPOULOS: Just to be clear: If this bill — if there were a vote to end the debate today, you would not vote to end the debate, to get this…

NELSON: I would have voted no. I would have voted no. I would have voted to end — not to end debate. I would have voted no on a cloture vote to end debate.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you wouldn’t let it get off the floor?

NELSON: So I would not let it get off the floor. That’s what that means at the — that’s the next round.

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