Lawmakers on committees with jurisdiction on health care reform legislation who oppose the creation of a publicly-funded health insurance option to compete with private insurers, received more money, on average, from the health care sector than members who support it, according to a new study of campaign money conducted by the Center for Responsive Politics. Members who have said 'no' to a public plan option received an average of $1.3 million over their career (as far back as 1989 when the Center began collecting data) versus $900,000 for those who said 'yes,' the study says.

Over the past three weeks, the Center's staff called lawmakers on all five of the congressional committees working on health care legislation to get their stance on the public plan option and they analyzed their campaign donations. In total, the Center's staff looked at 187 members. No information was available regarding 50 of the lawmakers contacted that were included in the report.

And improtant caveat to the study was that not everyone responded 'yes' or no 'when' asked about whether or not they supported a public plan option. Among the undecided was Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., Chairman of the Finance Committee, who has received $3.8 million from the health care sector. Baucus ranked third in the study, behind Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and John McCain, R-Ariz., who have raked in a total of $8.3 million and $9 million, respectively, from the health care sector.