Reading over Eric Kleefeld’s report of the candidate debate in NY-23, I learned something new about Democrat Bill Owens: it turns out he supports the public option included in the House health care bill unveiled today.

Owens was generally supportive of the health care bill, though there were things he would modify, such as raising the ceiling for exemptions on small businesses. He also endorsed the minimal public option in the current bill, after having previously been skeptical of the public option: “I think moving towards this legislation is very appropriate. I think the type or the form of the public option included in this bill is reasonable. It is not one that allows people to move to the government option if they already have health insurance overage. So it’s not going to control a significant segment of the population.”

Obviously Owens is advocating closed exchanges, which is actually a bad idea that restricts choice and competition. But he did verbally endorse the public option and health care reform generally, unlike his two competitors, Republican Dede Scozzafava or Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman. So he could reasonably be expected to be a vote for health care reform if he reached the Congress, and Congress could have him as a member in time for their final vote, which the Speaker said on her conference call with bloggers could happen late next week. John Garamendi, in CA-10, would almost certainly support this bill, and is likely to join the House by winning election next Tuesday as well.

Point being, in case there’s any worry that the health care bill actually doesn’t have the votes in the House at the moment, two potential additional votes are on the way. Although, Alyson Schwartz told the New York Times that they have the votes to pass the bill regardless.

I don’t know if this declaration of support is enough to justify MoveOn.org endorsing Owens and asking its members to donate to his campaign in the final days, given that he’s likely to be a bit of a problem as the years go on. But it’s the most definitive statement Owens has made about his support of health care reform and the public option, and it should be interesting to see how this effects the polling in the district, which supports a public option by a 52-42 count according to an R2K (Daily Kos) poll.