One Premium, Two Checks: How Abortion Will Be Paid For Under The Nelson Compromise

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Brian Beutler
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/12/one-premium-two-checks-how-abortion-will-be-paid-for-under-the-nelson-compromise.php?ref=fpb

In the House health care bill, consumers who receive federal premium subsidies would be forbidden from buying any insurance policy that covers abortion. That provision--the so-called Stupak amendment--threatened to blow up health care reform. Originally, it's the language Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) wanted to see in the Senate health care bill. In the end, he didn't get that.

But what he did get might still draw the ire of pro-choice activists and legislators. According to a senior Senate leadership aide, under the Nelson compromise, "ndividuals receiving subsidies will have one premium that they pay with two distinct transactions."

Put another way: If you're buying insurance with help from the government, and the policy you want to buy covers abortions, you have to write two checks (or authorize two credit card transactions, etc.) for your plan. If the plan costs $1000 a month, and the insurer plans to sequester $50 to put into a pool that covers abortions, you have to make one payment of $950 and a separate payment of $50.

So far, leading pro-choice Democrats in the Senate say they can abide by that. Here's Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) Patty Murray (D-WA):


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1. Do they promise that people who don't get federal subsidies will not have

to pay extra riders for this benefit also?

Is the promise that we get to keep the coverage we have a lie?