Stabenow: House and Dems hammering out final health bill details

House and Senate Democrats are hammering out final details of how they'll finish healthcare legislation, Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) said Wednesday evening.

Stabenow said leaders in both chambers were in the process of finding out what changes would have to be made to the Senate's original healthcare bill in order to finally pass health reform through Congress.

"What we're doing right now is negotiating agreements as to what changes to the bill would be acceptable to all sides," Stabenow said during an appearance on MSNBC.

The Michigan Democrat described negotiations as an effort to build trust and comity between House and Senate Democrats, who had at time been distrustful of the other during the healthcare debate. 

House Democrats have said they don't trust the Senate to act to make changes to the Senate bill, which the House would likely have to pass before they're able to take up a new bill to make changes to that original legislation.

"I think it's reasonable that they know what we agree to, and we know what they agree to," Stabenow said. "And we'll need to indicate that, that we're ready to go forward. And so I think we can get this done."

The series of changes being negotiated would be passed through the budget reconciliation process, which would allow Senate Democrats to sidestep the 60 vote threshold to end a filibuster and finish healthcare efforts with a simple majority.

In a separate appearance on MSNBC on Wednesday night, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said he expected more than enough votes to make those changes under reconciliation.

"There's no question in my mind that we get somewhere between 52 and 57 votes, something like that, for a reconciliation that actually improves the bill," he said.

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