Pelosi and Reid Decline to Select Non-Voting Members for * Medicaid Comm.

Pelosi and Reid Decline to Select Non-Voting Members for the Administration's Medicaid Commission.

WASHINGTON, May 26 /U.S. Newswire/ -- House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid released the followin statement today on their decision to decline to appoint non-voting members to the Bush Administration's Medicaid Commission. The Republicans budget, which passed in April, included $10 billion in cuts to Medicaid. The Commission will recommend how to make those cuts:

"After much deliberation, we have decided not to appoint Members of the Senate and House as non-voting members of the Administration's Medicaid Commission. An invitation to Democrats to select four Members of the Senate and House to advisory roles without a vote is wholly inadequate to lend any Commission even the air of bipartisanship.

"In contrast, the Administration will select all 15 voting members and 15 'non-voting advisor members,' with Senate and House Republicans invited to select four non-voting advisory Members of the House and Senate. Not only is it inadequate to offer four selections out of 38 positions to Democrats, but it is inappropriate to offer any Member of the House or Senate, whether Democrat or Republican, a non-voting role on such a Commission.

"Unfortunately, the partisan nature of the Commission and the lack of voting rights are not our only reasons for refusing to appoint Members.

"We fundamentally disagree with the premise that this Commission should make recommendations on how to cut Medicaid outlays by $10 billion by September 1. While we need to reduce the deficit, we should not make cuts affecting the most vulnerable Americans in order to finance more tax cuts for the wealthy. If there are budget cuts to be made, we should also look to other initiatives within the jurisdictions of the relevant Committees. ..cont'd

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=48017

Good for Reid & Pelosi for taking a stand

let the repubs twist in the wind on this one, and hopefully get into some fights with republican govenors...

:popcorn:

now they've just been denied their cover!

The only downside is the name-calling of "obstructionist" or "no-plan" but that was gonna happen anyway.