GOP attempt to reverse Obama mandate for birth control coverage is defeated in the Senate:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Senate has defeated a Republican effort to roll back President Barack Obama's policy on contraception insurance coverage.

The measure sponsored by Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt, a Republican, was defeated 51-48. The measure, an amendment to a pending transportation bill, would have allowed employers and insurers to opt out of portions of the president's health care law they found morally objectionable. That would have included the law's requirement that insurers cover the costs of birth control.

Republicans said it was a matter of freedom of religion; Democrats said it was an assault on women's rights and could be used to cancel virtually any part of the law. source:

Blunt (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)In a win for Democrats, the Senate voted Thursday to table an amendment permitting employers and insurers to opt out of provisions in President Obama's health care law on moral or religious grounds.

The Senate voted 51-48 to table the amendment, which was offered by Senate Republican Minority Leader Roy Blunt of Missouri as an add-on to the transportation funding bill. Blunt and fellow Republicans cast the amendment as a fight to protect First Amendment rights (which includes the freedom of religion.) Prior to the vote, Blunt argued that the language should be deemed non-controversial by his colleagues, stating on the Senate floor that every member of the Senate, barring some of the most recently elected members, "have voted for bills that have this language in them."

But Democrats said the amendment limits access to contraception and infringes on women's rights at a time when Congress needs to focus on the economy and employment. "These aren't the issues we should be debating right now," Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet said on the Senate floor.