Breaking News - First Vote on Reid's Health Care Bill is 8 PM on Saturday

[Correction made to post on 11/23] Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) filed cloture and scheduled a vote on his “mammoth" 2,074-page health care reform bill (H.R. 3590) at 8 PM on Saturday. The Democrats wish to rush the vote before Senators return home for Thanksgiving. If the vote passes then bill would be debated and could likely pass and wind up in conference with the House and with only the Democrats crafting the final compromise bill suitable to just the Democrats because no Republican or Conservative democrat votes would be needed. Well, now we will see if the Republicans stand strong and if old lions like Sen Joe Lieberman and other conservatives will stand tough and defeat this bill.

Republicans were able to "wrangled 10 hours of debate out of Democrats" instead of their original plan to debate for an hour and slip out of town. One Republican Senate aide  related "Now the American people will have all day to understand what this vote means and potentially persuade some Democrats why it would be a bad vote." As Reported by Roll Call, “Under the rules, we would only have been entitled to one hour of debate before the vote. Now we have all day to flip one Democrat,” the aide said. “The reading would've been to an empty chamber after the vote had happened, press would've gone home, and Americans would've turned the channel. Now it's show time.”

Emily Pierce of Roll Call summarizes:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Thursday afternoon set the procedural wheels in motion for a crucial vote on a major health care reform bill Saturday night at 8 p.m. and scored a coup by apparently persuading Republicans to abandon their plans to have the entire 2,074-page bill read aloud on the Senate floor.

Speaking on the floor of the Senate on Thursday afternoon, Reid filed a motion to limit debate, or invoke cloture, on the motion to proceed to a House-passed tax bill that will serve as a shell for the $848 billion Senate health care measure that he unveiled Wednesday.

In doing so, Reid also asked for and received the consent of Republicans to avoid more votes this week as well as a threatened, lengthy reading of the Senate bill. Reid’s move means the Senate will wrap up work Saturday and avoid coming into session next week.

Reid needs the votes of all 60 Members of the Democratic Conference in order to beat back a filibuster on the motion to proceed to the debate, given the unanimous opposition of all 40 Republicans in the chamber. Sixty votes are needed to invoke cloture.

One senior Senate Republican aide said the GOP leadership agreed to forego [sic] the reading of the Senate bill as well as separate, simple majority vote on starting debate on the bill in exchange for an all-day debate on the measure Saturday.

Read the following great explanation by on why the Saturday vote is so important, and why no Democrat should get a pass on claiming it’s simply “procedural” make sure you read Sen. DeMint’s post at Red State: Sen Jim DeMint summarized the battle very clearly:

To begin debate on this new version of Obamacare, Reid will play a shell game. He needs 60 senators to “vote to proceed” to an unrelated piece of legislation, and once he clears that hurdle he will strike that bill’s text and insert his new health care bill. But don’t be fooled by senators that will say they oppose a government takeover but just wanted to allow debate on health care, they are not being honest.The simple fact is this: Any senator that votes to proceed to the Reid-Obama bill is voting for a government takeover of health care.

Why? Because, President Obama and Harry Reid cannot pass a government takeover without clearing 60 vote procedural hurdles in the Senate — but they also know that vulnerable Democrats likely cannot win reelection if they vote for this unpopular bill. So they want all Democrats to stick together on the vote to proceed, then some Democrats will vote against final passage of the bill and claim they tried to stop it.

Senators who say they just want to allow for debate are trying to deceive their voters while giving President Obama the crucial votes he needs to pass a government takeover of health care.

Voters should be watching and remember who stands up for their freedom and who stands with the special interests who want to ram through this takeover.

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