Senate votes to end Obamacare, Planned Parenthood funding

The U.S. senate approved a bill late Thursday aimed at seriously compromising Barack Obama’s health care program as well as the public funding of Planned Parenthood, an association that specializes in defending women’s reproductive rights.

Using a budget tool called reconciliation, which allows a bill to pass with 51 votes, the Senate passed the legislation 52-47.

The final decision on the bill is expected in the next two days after the final vote on reviving the Healthcare Freedom Reconciliation Act that is expected to take place by the end of the week.

Democrats oppose defunding Planned Parenthood, and Pelosi said they could not support pushing decisions on funding to the states.

McConnell said he hoped the House would do the same, leaving the choice with President Obama.

One amendment, by Senators Patty Murray and Ron Wyden, would have authorized $1 billion in federal funding for groups that provide elective abortions.

Instead, she said that what the legislators did was give the people the “cold shoulder of indifference”.

The vote comes after anti-abortion activists released videos earlier this year allegedly showing organization officials discussing the sale of fetal tissue, which sent GOP officials and conservatives into an uproar.

“For too long, Democrats did everything to prevent Congress from passing the type of legislation necessary to help these Americans who are hurting”, McConnell, R-Ky., said on the Senate floor Thursday.

The legislation still needs a vote in the House of Representatives, as it differs from a House version passed in October that concentrated on repealing the law’s mandates for individuals to buy health insurance and for larger companies to offer health plans to employees. The group says the videos were deceptively doctored and say it has done nothing illegal.

Pro-life supporters recite the rosary with Bishop David L. Ricken of Green Bay, Wis., during a prayer service in late August outside of a Planned Parenthood facility in Grand Chute, WI. Though Obama’s overhaul was enacted five years ago, Republicans have yet to produce a detailed proposal to replace it. Jon Tester, D-Mont., who heads the Senate Democratic campaign committee, said of the GOP’s failure to propose an alternative.

Republicans argued that voters were on their side. Furthermore, a bill passed by both houses now could streamline future attempts to successfully repeal the law in the event they won control of the Oval Office and Congress in 2016.

Democrats have been able to block past repeal attempts.