The House of Representatives has passed a sweeping $875 billion health care reform bill. The measure, which cleared the Senate in December, will now head to President Barack Obama to be signed into law.
The bill passed in a 219-212 vote. All 178 Republicans opposed it, along with 34 Democrats.
CNN is tracking every development today with continuous updates, the Political Ticker and live gavel-to-gavel coverage.
Tiger Woods said Sunday that he is focused on "living a life of amends" after "living the life of a lie" in one of his first interviews since a November car crash outside his home unleashed a media frenzy amid rumors of extramarital affairs.
[Updated 6:07 p.m.] The Red River crested Sunday, with officials in North Dakota and Minnesota keeping a wary eye on levees and dikes intended to shore up the river's edge.
Farther south, authorities said they linked four deaths to a spring snow storm. The waters of the Red River reached 36.99 feet - 19 feet above flood level - at 9:30 a.m. (10:30 a.m. ET), the National Weather Service reported Sunday evening.
Water surrounded some homes near the river in Fargo, where 700,000 sandbags guarded the city from creeping waters. At least 10 people have been rescued from floodwaters in the area since Friday, according to the U.S. Coast
Guard.
[Updated 5:11 p.m.] President Obama's appearance and comments at an immigration rally was followed by comments from Gustavo Torres, executive director of the Baltimore-based immigrant advocacy group CASA de Maryland.
Torres told the crowd, "Mr. President, we are going to hold you accountable" after Obama said he would do everything he could to reach a deal on immigration.
A roundup of perspectives on the health care vote published on the eve of the vote:Â Â
“In reality, if you strip out all the gimmicks and budgetary games and rework the calculus, a wholly different picture emerges: The health care reform legislation would raise, not lower, federal deficits, by $562 billion.†(Douglas Holtz-Eakin, The New York Times)
“One of the problems Democrats have had is that it's very easy to understand the one thing the bill does to spend money—purchase insurance for people who can't afford it—and considerably harder to explain the many things it does to save money. Another is that a lot of the savings have to do with changing how medicine is practiced, which people are less familiar with than how insurance is purchased.
But the fact that the cost controls are complicated and numerous doesn't mean they're absent, or that they won't work.†(Ezra Klein, Newsweek)
The White House released a statement Sunday afternoon which included the text of an executive order related to the funding of abortion in the health care bill. You can read the full text of the statement and the executive order below.
Five militants were killed Sunday night by a U.S. drone in Pakistan's tribal region, two intelligence officials and one local government official told CNN.
Will the health care fight end with the expected vote by the House today? Not exactly. It's all a bit complicated, but here's an attempt at an explanation.
First, there are two things at play.
There's the health care bill that the Senate approved in December - that's what the House will vote on today. If it passes, it becomes law. At that time, health care reform will be a reality, only awaiting the president’s signature.
The Thai government has offered to meet with anti-government protesters in a move to end a political stalemate that has prompted mass demonstrations in the capital, fficials said.
[Updated 4:24 p.m.] Two rockets struck near the Kabul Afghanistan International Airport military complex Sunday evening, hours after a suicide attack killed ten Afghan civilians, according to the U.S. military.
A third rocket landed in open ground outside the perimeter of the complex, and a fourth hit the Pul-e Charke district of Kabul. There were no reports of coalition or civilian casualties at the military complex.
[Posted 12:02 p.m.] Ten Afghan civilians were killed and seven others were wounded in a suicide attack Sunday in southern Afghanistan's Helmand province, a provincial spokesman said.
1:00 pm ET - House health care reform vote -Â The U.S. House of Representatives convenes to conclude debate and cast its final vote on President Obama's health care reform measure.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has called for a manual recount of the votes cast in the country's tight parliamentary elections, saying he is asking for it to "preserve the integrity of the electoral process." FULL POST
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