Snowe: Mass. election doesn't change mind on healthcare

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) said today that this week's GOP upset in Massachusetts has not changed her mind on voting for the healthcare bill because she wasn't supportive of the process anyway.

Some suggested Snowe may change her mind and support reform now that Democrats lack a 60-vote supermajority. But Snowe said the election results are irrelevant to her vote, because Democrats acted rashly in pushing through the bill in December. A moderate, Snowe was the only Republican vote for a healthcare bill last fall in the Finance Committee, although she opposed the bill on a final floor vote.

"They have to go back to the drawing board in the process," she said. "So it's a question of what it is and how it's accomplished, which I objected to and repeatedly stated to the president and to others. That's why it did not achieve my support."

Snowe also shot back at Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), who over the holidays gave an interview to the New York Times in which he called attempting to court Snowe's vote "a waste of time" because she had "no intention" of supporting the effort.

"I tried to work in a very concerted, substantive, straightforward manner to give my very best views base on my efforts and homework," she said. "I'm sorry he reached that conclusion... It was wrong."