Moynihan May Abandon Health Mandate : Reform: White House withholds comment on report that Senate Finance chairman wants to drop provision that employers pay workers’ premiums.

The White House adopted a wait-and-see attitude Sunday over reports that the Senate Finance Committee chairman will abandon mandates on employers or individuals in his latest health care reform plan.

The proposal by Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.) was officially still under wraps, but it was known to have veered sharply from the reforms favored by President Clinton that Moynihan had put forward in early June.

Two of the five congressional committees with jurisdiction over health care--one in the House and one in the Senate--have already adopted plans requiring employers to buy insurance for their workers, the so-called employer mandate that is part of Clinton’s original health care proposal for universal coverage.

But congressional sources said Moynihan has decided not to keep the employer mandate (with exceptions for small businesses) that he suggested earlier. Moynihan and the committee’s top Republican, Sen. Bob Packwood of Oregon, have told Clinton they could not get an employer mandate provision through their committee.

The Washington Post reported Sunday that a draft 139-page proposal would aim for 95% coverage of Americans by 2000 through subsidies, incentives for small businesses to buy insurance and changes in insurance rules.

A national health commission then would recommend ways to cover everyone else. Congress would have to consider the advice, but it would not have to follow it.

Moynihan was spending the weekend at his Upstate New York farm and was unavailable for comment Sunday.

The Moynihan plan is still unfinished, and a Republican congressional source said Sunday that initial news media reports appeared to be drawn from a draft that was incomplete and not entirely accurate. The source insisted on anonymity.

Moynihan plans to meet privately today with the committee, including Sen. John H. Chafee (R-R.I.) and other moderates who on Friday advanced their own proposal for expanding coverage without mandates.

White House Communications Director Mark D. Gearan said Sunday that there would be no comment on Moynihan’s proposal before he makes it public. But the White House is viewing any debate on reform as a good sign.

“Overall, the events of the last two weeks show progress on health care reform continues,” Gearan said. Thursday, the House Education and Labor Committee became the second congressional panel to approve Clinton-style reforms, including the mandate on employers to pay 80% of their workers’ premiums.

An Administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Moynihan’s emerging proposal was receiving close attention at the White House, a sign of his power in the Senate and Clinton’s eagerness to get health care reform passed this year. However, the official said, it was still unclear whether the plan would meet Clinton’s criteria for universal health care.

Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) warned Democrats about rushing too quickly toward health care reform.

“Let’s get it right. We do a lot of things around here--if we don’t get them right, somebody’s going to be hurt. It might be the very people we’re trying to help,” he said in a C-SPAN interview broadcast Sunday.

Dole said a Republican alternative would reform restrictive insurance laws and provide subsidies to businesses, improving the system without a massive overhaul.