Obama calls holdouts on health care

WASHINGTON -- Amid intense lobbying by the Obama administration on health-care legislation, House Democratic leaders weighed fresh concessions yesterday to abortion opponents and worked to ease concerns among Hispanic holdouts.

"We're very close" to having enough votes to prevail, said Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, though he added that a scheduled Saturday vote could be delayed by a day or two. He sought to pin the blame on possible Republican delaying tactics.

"Nice try, Rep. Hoyer, but you can't blame Republicans when the fact is you just don't have the votes," said Antonia Ferrier, spokeswoman for the GOP leader, Rep. John A. Boehner of Ohio.

GOP leaders said all 177 House Republicans stood ready to oppose the $1.2 trillion bill, which would create a federally supervised insurance marketplace where the uninsured could purchase coverage.

Consumers would have the option of picking a government-run plan, the most hotly contested item in the legislation and the basis for the Republican charges that Democrats were planning a government takeover of the insurance industry.

Democrats said their bill was designed to spread coverage to millions who lack it, ban insurance industry practices such as denying coverage on the basis of pre-existing medical conditions and restrain the growth of health care spending nationally.

Obama and his administration lobbied furiously for its passage. But several Democrats have announced their opposition, most of them moderate to conservative members of the so-called Blue Dog Coalition.

Democrats hold 258 seats in the House and can afford 40 defections and still wind up with 218, a majority if all lawmakers vote.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic leadership are trying to resolve controversies over the bill's treatment of illegal immigrants and insurance coverage for abortion.

Federal law currently prohibits the use of federal funds to pay for abortions except in the case of rape, incest or situations in which the life of the mother is in danger. That left unresolved whether individuals would be permitted to use their own funds to buy insurance coverage for the procedure in the federally backed insurance exchange envisioned under the legislation.

The controversy surrounding illegal immigrants remains "a work in progress," Rep. Nydia M. Velazquez, a New Yorker and chairwoman of the Hispanic Caucus, said after a mid-day meeting in Pelosi's office.

As drafted, the legislation permits illegal immigrants to purchase coverage with their own money inside the insurance exchange that would be created -- a provision that the 23-member Hispanic Caucus wants retained.