Committee leader scales back proposal to end FEHBP

The health care bill the Senate Finance Committee is debating contains a modified version of a Republican amendment that would end the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program.

The scaled-back language -- added to the underlying legislation by Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont. -- would allow, but not require, civil servants to leave FEHBP for state-based health care exchanges starting in 2013. Representatives of Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, the sponsor of the original amendment, said they still plan to push the stronger language.

"The amendment follows work that Sen. Grassley has done for a long time in seeking to have Congress live under the laws it passes for the rest of the country," said spokeswoman Jill Kozeny. "The amendment hasn't been withdrawn because the chairman's modification doesn't accomplish what the amendment seeks to do."

It is not clear, however, whether Grassley's proposal will receive a vote. Committee members filed more than 500 amendments to the bill, and the panel is unlikely to get to all of them during its markup, which is expected to continue next week.

Daniel Adcock, legislative director for the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association, said he did not think many federal employees would choose to leave FEHBP for state-based exchanges, because FEHBP would have lower costs and better benefits. "I think most people would look at the FEHBP and the state exchanges, and it would be a no-brainer," Adcock said.

He expressed concern the committee would consider Grassley's original amendment or make another modification, and noted that the federal insurance program often becomes a "political football" because members of Congress use it. "We're going to be anxious about the possibility of someone, somewhere else in the process making that a mandatory thing," he said.

NARFE also took exception to a proposal from Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., to allow certain private citizens to enroll in FEHBP. On Thursday, the group sent a letter to the committee opposing the amendment, because it would place those enrollees in the same risk pool as federal employees already in the program.

"While NARFE supports access to comprehensive health care for all Americans, we would oppose legislation that would open the FEHBP to nonfederal civilian enrollees without calculating their premiums in a separate risk pool," NARFE President Margaret Baptiste wrote.

Wyden spokeswoman Jennifer Hoelzer said the senator filed the amendment because he believes "all Americans should get the same health care as members of Congress."