Democrats get infusion of campaign money from health care

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By JASON ROBERSON
The Dallas Morning News
jroberson@dallasnews.com
10:29 AM CST on Tuesday, December 4, 2007

In Texas and across the country, doctors, insurers and health care executives — long considered among the most conservative of Americans — are donating much more to Democratic candidates than in past campaigns, which some call an indication that the industry is ready for major change to the health care system.

The splurge comes at a time when polls show health care reform is a top concern among voters, with candidates on both sides of the aisle putting forward proposals.

So far, the candidate of choice, or at least the one collecting the most health care-related donations, is New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who tried to overhaul the health care system while her husband was president.

The stakes are high, both for the nation’s patients and for the industry, since the next president is likely to shape the debate on how to pay for and deliver health care in this country.

Depending on who is elected, the role of government and employers could swing dramatically, from Democrat John Edwards’ call to require all employers with five or more workers to provide coverage or contribute 6 percent of payroll toward a public program on one end of the spectrum, to Republican Fred Thompson’s call to “divorce [the] complete dependence people have on employment for their insurance.”

In Texas, health care executives have donated almost twice as much to presidential candidates in this campaign as they did in the last election. Doctors and hospitals have a vested interest in increasing the number of people who have insurance, since that ups their chances of getting paid. Meanwhile, insurers want to ensure that people and companies keep purchasing plans from private insurance companies, as opposed to switching to a government-run system.

So, perhaps it should not be surprising that, through September, Texans in areas ranging from surgery to medical supplies donated $934,000, up 75 percent from the $531,000 poured in during the same period of the 2004 campaign.

This time around, about as much of that money went to Democrats as Republicans. Democratic candidates raked in a total of $459,650, versus $474,234 for Republican presidential candidates.

On the national level, the Democrats actually beat the Republicans. Through September, Democratic candidates collected $6.5 million from the health care industry, compared with $4.8 million for Republican candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington, D.C.-based campaign finance research group.

Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic front-runner, has been the biggest beneficiary from Texas health industry donations, with $237,000 through September; Republican front-runner Rudy Giuliani came in second, with $223,000.

Next in line for Democratic contributions was Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, with $110,000 from Texas health care donors. Mr. Obama also collected the state’s single-largest such donation, with $24,000 from the Dallas-based medical technology company T-System Inc., according to a study prepared for The Dallas Morning News by the Center for Responsive Politics.

Arizona Sen. John McCain was a distant second on the Republican side, at $90,000.

Different approaches

Not surprisingly, the Republicans and Democrats propose different approaches to solving the nation’s health care problems.

The top candidates in each party all call for expansion of the existing private insurance market, as opposed to creation of a single-payer, government-run system.

But, in general, Democratic candidates promise broader and more immediate changes, with new mandates, programs and funding.

Democrats would increase federal spending to pay for health insurance coverage, with the money raised primarily by repealing some of President Bush’s tax cuts. They also want to pass legislation requiring employers to either provide insurance for their employees or contribute to a fund to help workers buy their own.

Republican candidates would rely on indirect approaches rather than new government programs.

They do not propose an increase in federal health care spending. Instead, the Repubicans would extend the Bush tax cuts to provide tax incentives to help individuals purchase health coverage. The Republicans’ goal is to move insurance away from an employer-based model to one in which individuals buy their own policies with the help of a deduction or other tax break, according to a November analysis by PricewaterhouseCoopers, the national accounting and consulting firm.

One might think the free-market approach emphasized by Republicans would win more support among Texans than the mandate-driven Democratic plans.

But, despite the fact that Democrats have been out of power for nearly a decade, and the fact that Republicans traditionally outpace the Democrats in donations, that hasn’t been the case thus far.

Explanations for trend

Sheila Krumholz, executive director for the Center for Responsive Politics, says the Democratic surge shouldn’t come as a surprise — a similar donation migration (in reverse) was seen in many industries from 1994 through 1996, when the Republicans took control of Congress. “When power changes hands in Congress, the money follows the power.”

Another reason for the change in Texas, according to Darren Whitehurst, a lobbyist for the Texas Medical Association, is that doctors here have already won the Republican-led battle to limit medical malpractice lawsuits, via passage of the Texas tort reform bill in 2003, and can afford to switch horses.

But Texas has been a bedrock of conservative support, and that didn’t end in 2003. Mr. Bush collected four times as much from health industry contributors in 2004 as did his Democratic opponents.

That’s what makes this year’s donation symmetry so surprising.

The Scooter Store is an example of this shift. The supplier of motorized wheelchairs based in New Braunfels, just north of San Antonio, devoted its entire $4,000 contribution to Mr. Bush’s re-election campaign in 2004.

The store has upped the ante this time around, with $7,600 in donations. But, so far, all of that money has gone to Democrats — $6,600 to Mrs. Clinton and $1,000 to Mr. Obama.

The store, along with others in its business, has a vested interest in preserving a government insurance benefit that lets seniors use Medicare to purchase scooters.