Schumer promises public option in healthcare bill

By Jeffrey Young

Posted: 07/05/09 11:45 AM [ET]

The healthcare reform bill that emerges from Congress this year will include a government-run public health insurance option, regardless of the bipartisan negotiations seeking a compromise in the Senate, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Sunday.  “Make no mistake about it, the president is for this strongly. There will be a public option in the final bill,” Schumer said on CBS News’s “Face the Nation.”  Schumer made his prediction just days before the Senate returned to the work of getting a bill passed by the first week of August amid significant disagreement between Democrats and Republicans — and among Democrats themselves — over controversial issues such as the public option.  Moreover, key members of Finance Committee, on which Schumer has a seat, have been engaged for months in a delicate process of bipartisan negotiations on the contents of the healthcare reform bill, which is expected to require new spending around $1 trillion to extend insurance coverage to nearly all Americans, though Obama and congressional Democrats vow they will offset all new spending with cuts and tax increases.  The major sticking point between Democrats and Republicans on the Finance Committee — and throughout Congress — has been the public option. Democrats maintain that a not-for-profit, nationwide alternative to private insurance must be made available to “keep the insurance companies honest,” Schumer said. “We don’t trust the private insurance companies left to their own devices and neither do the American people.” http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/schumer-promises-public-option-in-healthcare-bill-2009-07-05.html