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| Children's Health Insurance |
September 25, 2007 |
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Dear Friends,
There’s a program for children’s health insurance called NewMexikids. At the national level, it’s called the State Children’s Health Insurance Program or “S-CHIP”. The program was put in place ten years ago with broad bi-partisan support when there was a Republican controlled Congress and a Democratic President. Now, we need to reauthorize it with a Democrat controlled Congress and a Republican President.
This shouldn’t be hard to do on a bipartisan basis, should it?
S-CHIP is a program that works. Since it was created ten years ago, S-CHIP has decreased the number of uninsured children by nearly 25%. It covers six million kids whose parents work but cannot afford insurance on their own. S-CHIP provides coverage through private health insurance plans so that children can see doctors when they are sick, get checkups, prescription medicines and hospitalizations. This bill will allow us to continue to cover kids currently enrolled and another four million who are uninsured now.
In July, the Democratic majority in the House jammed through a bill that had some huge problems with it for a state like New Mexico. It took a lot of money from a very popular program for New Mexico seniors and used the money for a very large expansion of the children’s health insurance program. I opposed the House bill. I just can’t see taking health care choices away from seniors to pay for a very large expansion for middle and upper income families with children. Under the House bill, there would actually have been some families in America who could have paid the Alternative Minimum Tax because they are “rich” and qualify for children’s health insurance because they are “poor”.
The Senate took a more pragmatic approach and passed a bill that fixes some problems, would get 4 million more uninsured children covered and doesn’t take money from Medicare to pay for it. Sixty-eight Senators voted in favor of the Senate bill. It’s a much better bill for New Mexico.
Last week, I got seventeen Republicans to sign a letter to Speaker Pelosi asking her to bring up the Senate bill for a vote. That was important because some Democrats in the House will probably oppose the more modest Senate bill.
It looks as though we’re having an impact. This week, the House is going to take up an S-CHIP bill almost identical to the Senate version. The bill will probably pass the House, but faces a veto threat by the President. I disagree with President Bush’s intention to veto this legislation and I am encouraging my colleagues in the House to vote in favor of the bill.
Getting two-thirds of the House – a veto proof majority – to vote for this bill is a very long shot. Make that a very, very long shot.
But we’ll take this one step at a time. We can continue the successful Children’s Health Insurance Program without cutting Medicare for seniors. That’s what I’ll continue to work toward.
Wish you were here,
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