Graham wants investigation

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham said Sunday that he wants South Carolina's top prosecutor to investigate a deal that helped secure the 60th vote needed to pass a Democratic health care bill through the Senate.

Blasting Senate Democrats for what he called "backroom deals that amount to bribes," Graham found much to complain about in their health care bill. He was particularly irked that the senator who provided that final vote to head off a Republican filibuster, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, cut a deal in which the federal government pays his state's share of the cost for new Medicaid recipients.

Graham, a South Carolina Republican, called on state Attorney General Henry McMaster to review the constitutionality of the deal, and a McMaster spokesman said he looks forward to meeting with Graham to discuss it.

"There is one state in the union where new enrollees for Medicaid will be signed up and it won't cost anybody in that state money," Graham said on CNN's "State of the Union."

"A lot of people, Republicans and Democrats, are upset by this," Graham said. "Is it constitutional? I want the attorney general of South Carolina to look at this."

Nelson, who skirted the issue in a news conference Saturday, confirmed the deal in a CNN interview Sunday. But he said he didn't ask for special favors.

"What I said is the governor of Nebraska has contacted me, he's said publicly he's having trouble with the budget, this will add to his budget woes. And I said, 'Look, we have to have that fixed.' "

Graham also was upset that Nelson, a pro-life Democrat, compromised on abortion.

"I think Sen. Nelson lost a lot of trust in the pro-life community for pushing a compromise that no one on our side believes works," Graham said.

With no Republican support for the bill, Democratic leaders had a hard time compiling the 60 votes needed to avoid a Republican filibuster.

Covering the politics of the Lowcountry, South Carolina and the nation.

The deal-making, Graham said, was "seedy Chicago politics when you think about it, backroom deals that amount to bribes." It will make it difficult for Graham and other Republicans in the Senate to work with Democrats on other important issues, such as climate change, he said.

South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint was an early leader among Republican health care reform opponents, proclaiming that thwarting Obama's efforts could make health care his Waterloo.

"This process is not legislation. This process is corruption," Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., said Sunday, according to the AP.

Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island responded in a speech on the Senate floor, he said Republicans are embarked on a "no-holds- barred mission of propaganda, obstruction and fear. … There will be a reckoning. There will come a day of judgment about who was telling the truth."