Hatch is confident of stem cell bill passage
Shift in Congress may be enough to overcome another veto by Bush
By Robert Gehrke
The Salt Lake Tribune
sltrib.com
Article Last Updated:11/24/2006 01:43:29 AM MST
( Looks like Bush will be EATING his only veto on record so far.. )
WASHINGTON - Supporters of stem cell research are confident they will pass legislation expanding federally funded research in the next Congress - regardless of whether President Bush continues to oppose the move.
Congress passed the legislation last year, but Bush killed the bill, exercising his only veto in six years. But the election results have changed the landscape, and Sen. Orrin Hatch believes supporters can round up enough votes to override a presidential veto, if it comes to that.
"I think we have the votes in the Senate to override a veto, and we may have them in the House. I think we can get there," the Utah Republican said. "According to some, we're only a couple votes short, and I think I know where those votes are."
Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., who will be the lead sponsor of the House bill, said she recently spoke to the 41 new House Democrats and "to describe them as wildly enthusiastic about this bill would be an understatement."
"I think the election really sent a message to Washington that the voters want embryonic stem cell research passed," she said.
House Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has said passing the stem cell bill will be part of the agenda for the first 100 hours in the 110th Congress, and Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., chairman of the committee that deals with health care issues, says passage of the stem cell legislation is a high priority.
"We will be back again and again next year until we succeed in overturning the restrictions on stem cell research that hinder the search for new cures and delay the day when the hope of a better future becomes a reality for patients across America," Kennedy said.
Hoping to avoid that potentially embarrassing showdown with the White House, Hatch has been working with the administration to craft an agreement that might be palatable to the president, although he would not discuss specifics of the negotiations.
"I hope that if they are able to tinker with the bill a little bit, it might be more acceptable to the president," said Sarah Chamberlain, executive director of the Republican Main Street Partnership, a group of moderate Republicans who support the stem cell bill. "I hate to see the president veto it again, and I hate to see him in a position where there's a veto override. I think that would be very damaging where we don't mean it to be."
Bush implemented a policy in August 2001 allowing federal funding only for stem cell lines that existed at the time. Critics say those lines are of limited use and some are contaminated.
The stem cell legislation pushed by Hatch would allow federal funding for research on stem cells derived from embryos created for fertility clinics and donated by the patients.
Hatch says those embryos would be discarded, other- wise.
Congress passed the bill last year, but Bush vetoed it, and the House fell well short of the 288 votes needed to override the veto.
"I'm not going to stop pushing it until it's passed," Hatch said. "I think it's one of the most important biomedical research proposals in the country today."
The White House notes that the president has supported funding for research using the existing lines of embryonic stem cells, adult stem cells and cord blood.
"Those are facts that cannot be denied," said White House spokesman Blair Jones. "After careful and thoughtful deliberation with government and outside experts, there was only one moral line that the President said that he would not cross - and that is that federal taxpayer dollars should not be used in the destruction of embryos."
There is promising research on embryonic stem cells where the embryo is not destroyed, Jones said, "and we continue to look forward to the future of such research."
Stem cell research was a key issue in several races, hammered home by television commercials featuring actor Michael J. Fox, who has Parkinson's Disease, that ran in battleground Senate races in Missouri, Maryland and Virginia and were infamously mocked by conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh.
Hatch says he begged "my good friend" Fox not to do the ads and politicize the issue because it would make it harder to win over Republicans.
"This should not be polarized," Hatch said, adding that he had made headway swaying some who had opposed the bill and at least one stem cell opponent told him privately before he lost that he would change his stance. "They're worried they may be on the wrong side of history."
rgehrke@sltrib.com |
