Now, All Eyes Will Turn to the Senate

In case you missed it (but we're not sure how you could have) here is a short clip of the House of Representatives passing HR 3962 or the Affordable Health Care for America Act.

The historic vote was taken Saturday night and fulfills the Democratic Party's promise of quality, affordable health care to the American people.

The Act provides stability and security for Americans who have insurance; quality affordable options for those who don't; brings down the cost of health care for families, businesses and government -- while strengthening the financial health of Medicare.

The legislation is fully paid for and will bring down the long-term federal deficit.

One step closer towards comprehensive health care in America, the United States Senate now must follow suit.

Already, the Senate has aligned many parts of their bill to match the House version -- including providing unprecedented security and stability for Americans with insurance and is also fully paid for, reducing our long-term deficit.

Here in New Mexico, Senator Bingaman and Senator Udall have both indicated their support for health care reform which includes a public option.

Pelosi to Push the Public Option

In previous statements, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has stated that the fate of the public option would depend on the eventual negotiations that would occur between House and Senate leadership.

But with a favorable score from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) on the House version of the health care reform bill, House Speaker Pelosi has announced that a "robust" public option would be aggressively pushed through the House of Representatives. Coming in far under 900 billion dollars, the House version of health care reform comes under President Obama's goal and is also deficit neutral.

MoveOn.org has also released this new commercial focusing on the some 70% percent of the American public who support the public option:

To pass this bill, House Democrats need to muster 218 votes -- a number within sight. Rep. Raul Grijalva, one of the co-Chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus has stated that House Democrats are within 8 votes of achieving the 218 votes needed for passage.

He does note however, that some of the 256 Democrats in Congress will vote no and that House leadership is not wasting time with confirmed "no" votes from Democrats. (NM Congressman Ben Ray Lujan is a member of the Caucus and is a champion of the public option.)

The House bill would cover 96% of all Americans.

The Democratic Party of New Mexico -- and all of the members of our Congressional delegation -- support the inclusion of a public option in any health care reform bill passed.

We encourage you to call your representative today and stress the importance of a public option!

Contact information for your elected leaders can be found here.