'Democrats Lost Them': Here's Why 2020 Biden Voters Sat Out The 2024 Election (Rolling Stone)

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136. They had 60 votes for for 4 months and 10 days -- September 24, 2009 to February 4, 2010.

The House and Senate had both passed the bill, but there were differences between the two bills. Al Franken:

"Ordinarily, this wouldn't be a big deal. We'd convene a conference committee, hash out the differences, and then both chambers would vote to pass the unified bill that came out of the conference. But Republicans were still hell-bent on stopping us from passing health care reform, and now that they once again had forty-one votes in the Senate, they could stop us from voting on that unified bill."

Reconciliation was the only way to pass the bill.

Obama: "'What is it about sixty votes these folks don't understand?' I groused to my staff. 'Should I tell the thirty million people who can't get covered that they're going to have to wait another ten years because we can't get them a public option?'"