Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid,(D) Nevada, announced Monday the Senate health care reform bill will contain a public option with a provision for states to "opt out."
"I think it's the fairest way to go," said Reid at an afternoon press conference.
The bill is a melding, as he put it, of language from the Senate committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and the Finance committee.
"I believe we clearly will have the support of my caucus to move this bill and start legislating," Reid said.
Across the aisle Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell, (R) Kentucky said this of the bill, "While final details of this bill are still unknown, here's what we do know: It will be a thousand-page, trillion-dollar bill that raises premiums, raises taxes and slashes Medicare."
Reid's move is widely seen as risky because, as yet, he does not have the 60 votes needed to break a Republican filibuster. The 60 votes may even be needed to bring the bill to the floor for debate.
In the meantime, a few versions of this bill are headed to the Congressional Budget Office for price analysis.
