Oh, I know… President Obama said that it wouldn’t happen.
But apparently Speaker Pelosi and House Democrats weren’t listening to President Obama, because surely he was telling the truth… so it must be an act of defiance because in this 1900 page monstrosity of a bill it’s in there:
Douglas Johnson, legislative director for the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), referred specifically to language on page 110 of the new bill (H.R. 3962) which explicitly authorizes the "public health insurance option" to pay for all elective abortions.
The "public health insurance option" or "public plan" would be a health insurance program operated directly by the federal government, through the Department of Health and Human Services.
"The public plan will be a federal agency program, and all funds spent by the agency are federal funds," Johnson said. "The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service (CRS), in an October 9 memo obtained by NRLC, confirmed that all funds spent by the bill’s public plan will be federal funds. Prominent Democrats who have claimed that the federal government could pay for abortion with ‘private’ funds have been engaged in a big snow job — and in swallowing such a contrived, implausible claim, many journalists have been all too gullible."
Congressman Bart Stupak (D-Mi.) has proposed an amendment that would prohibit the federal government plan from paying for abortion (except to save the life of the mother, or in cases of rape or incest). But Speaker Pelosi intends to try to force the House to pass the 1990-page bill under a "closed rule" (a procedure that allows no amendments to be considered), reportedly because she fears that the House would adopt the Stupak Amendment if a vote were allowed.
NRLC and other pro-life groups are urging House members to vote against imposition of the closed rule. The showdown could occur on the House floor as soon as November 5 or 6.
The proposed House bill can be found here.
HT: The Blog Prof for the video and Jill Stanek for the NLRC presser.