6:12pm - Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota) made a motion for the second amendment offered by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) to be withdrawn. The motion was agreed to without objection.
6:12pm - The amendment on firearms passed by 78-11. 5:58pm - Sen. Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) briefly talked about his amendment to block the use of federal funds for certain firearms programs. Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota) said he had no objection to it. A vote is being called. 5:55pm - The motion to cloture passed by 85-2. 5:30pm - Consideration of the motion to invoke cloture is beginning. Sixty votes are needed to approve the substitute amendment that Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota) and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) have brought to the floor. 5:30pm - Housekeeping: In the January 23 liveblog of the Senate debate on IHCIA, we mixed up the health care stories of two Indian women. As described by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota), Ardel Hale Baker suffered a heart attack and had a letter taped to her leg by Indian Health Service staff about the lack of funds to pay for her treatment. It was a different woman who was told to wrap her knee in cabbage leaves, not Hale Baker. 5:20pm - Quorum call. 5:13pm - Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota) describes the vote sequence. First will be the cloture vote on the substitute amendment to S.1200 that he and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) brought to the floor. Then the Senate will debate and vote on two amendments offered by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina). "This is a piece of legislation that I think is going to make a difference in the lives of Americans who have expected and been promised good health care," said Dorgan, the chair of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. 5:11pm - Absence of a quorum. 5:10pm - "It's long time that we give our Indian health providers the tools that they need in their quest for excellence," said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). She said she anticipates final passage of the bill. "Passage of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act is long overdue." 5:02pm - Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), the vice chair of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, is talking about successful Alaska Native health care programs. 5:00pm - Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyoming), the top Republican on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, says all of his concerns about the bill have been resolved. "It's past due," he said of the IHCIA. "This piece of legislation needs to pass. It needs to pass now." Indian Health Care Improvement Act Amendments:S.1200 | H.R.1328 White House Document:
Statement of Administration Policy (January 22, 2008) Relevant Links:
Indian Health Service - http://www.ihs.gov
National Indian Health Board - http://www.nihb.org
