A complete description of the unfolding health care process in the Senate

by: Chris Bowers

Tue Nov 17, 2009 at 12:42

Courtesy of a Senate aide, here is a complete description of the process required to bring the health care bill to the floor of the Senate.

Health Care Process

1. Leader Reid moves to proceed to an HR bill, which will be the vehicle for the Senate health care bill, and files a cloture motion on the motion to proceed.

2. Two calendar days later, the cloture motion on the motion to proceed ripens (there has to be one intervening calendar day between the day you file cloture and the day you have the vote)

3. The cloture vote on the motion to proceed occurs one hour after we convene on the third day (If cloture is filed on Wednesday, the cloture vote is Friday. If cloture is filed on Thursday, the cloture vote is on Saturday, etc)

4. Assuming 60 Senators vote to limit debate on the motion to proceed and end the filibuster, the Senate invokes cloture on the motion to proceed

5. Thirty hours after cloture is invoked the Senate will proceed to vote on adoption of the motion to proceed itself (This assumes (a) consent will not be granted to yield back any post-cloture time on the motion to proceed and (b) consent will not be granted to adopt the motion to proceed itself---adoption of the motion to proceed itself is routinely agreed to by UC but Rs could force a roll call vote).

6. Upon adoption of the motion to proceed, the Senate will be on the Health Care bill

7. Leader Reid will immediately be recognized to offer the complete Senate substitute amendment to the Health Care bill

8. Under the rules (Rule XV, to be exact), an amendment must be read before debate can begin on an amendment.  (This is routinely waived by UC (you'll often hear Senators ask consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with when an amendment is offered) but Dr. Coburn has threatened that he will not agree to waive the reading of the substitute amendment).  Reading the entire substitute amendment would take several days.

9. Whether read aloud in full or not, at this point, the substitute amendment will be pending and the full amendment process will begin when we return from Thanksgiving Recess.

Democrats, in return, say they'll force Republicans to stay on the floor continuously throughout the exercise. At least one Coburn ally will have to remain on the floor to object to unanimous consent requests to dispense with the reading. Whether they'll be able to require the presence of more than one Republican, though, remains to be seen.

The long and short of it is that, starting today, the Senate health care bill will be debated in public for two weeks before debate starts on the Senate floor.  The Thanksgiving holiday, and all of these procedural hoops, delay the process tremendously compared to the House.  All of this is just to start debate on the health care bill on the Senate floor, and there will be many more hoops to jump through once that begins.