Daschle sees more GOP support for health bill coming after Snowe vote

Sen. Olympia Snowe's (R-Maine) decision to join Democrats to support health reform in a committee vote yesterday makes other GOP defections more likely, former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) said Wednesday.

Daschle said the Senate Finance Committee's vote in favor of a healthcare proposal in committee on Tuesday provided the bid to overhaul the health system major momentum, leading the former Democratic leader to rate the chances of a bill this year at 60 percent.

"It gives the president and everybody else an opportunity to say it's bipartisan," Daschle said this morning during an appearance on Bloomberg News. "It may only be one Republican, but you've got Republicans and Democrats working together to move legislation forward, and that's a very big plus for the president."

The former senator, who was President Barack Obama's pick to become secretary of Health and Human Services as well as healthcare czar before withdrawing, said he thinks Snowe's vote more likely other Republicans will support a final health bill.

"I don't think that you'll see many other Republicans do it," he said. "My guess is that you'll see one or two additional Republicans."

Daschle, who had long given the likelihood of a health bill this year even odds, said the odds are now up to 60 percent, though he said his successor, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) would have to maintain a careful balance in merging a bill between the Finance bill and the one to have been passed by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee.

"This is a tough call, because Sen. Reid's heart is with the public option," Daschle explained. "But he also understands that the challenge of passing legislation on the Senate floor means that he has to get 60 votes."