Interesting perspective...

"Since we don't cover our own kids, why cover immigrants?" As opposed to
"we need to cover all the kids"

-----Original Message-----
From: Anglo-American Health Policy Network [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Adam Oliver
Sent: Wednesday, January 28, 2009 12:15 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: AAHPN

SCHIP: Two Republican Amendments Defeated 
The Senate on Tuesday rejected two Republican amendments to SCHIP
reauthorization and expansion legislation, including an amendment that
would have limited states' abilities to expand coverage to documented
immigrants, CongressDaily reports (CongressDaily, 1/28). SCHIP is set to
expire on March 1. Under the expansion bill (HR 2
<http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.2:> ), children in
families with incomes of up to three times the federal poverty level
would qualify for the program. Supporters of the bill say it would raise
the number of children covered by SCHIP from about seven million to
about 11 million. The $31.5 billion measure would extend the program for
four-and-one-half years and would be funded mainly by a 61-cent-per-pack
increase in the federal cigarette tax (American Health Line
<http://www.americanhealthline.com/article.aspx?s=46518> , 1/27). An
amendment offered by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) would have prohibited
states from enrolling documented immigrant children and pregnant women
in SCHIP within five years of their entering the country unless the
state could show that it had enrolled 95% of eligible citizen children.
Documented immigrants are prohibited by federal law from signing up for
public programs during their first five years in the U.S., but a
provision in the reauthorization bill would allow states to waive the
waiting period for pregnant women and children. Hatch said, "Once those
kids are covered, I'm happy to work with my colleagues to cover legal
immigrant children, but our U.S. citizen children should be covered
first" (Armstrong [1], CQ Today, 1/27). The amendment was defeated by
voice vote. Senate Finance Committee <http://finance.senate.gov/>  Chair
Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said no state could meet the 95% requirement. He
added, "These ... [documented immigrant children] are sick through no
fault of their own, and their parents are paying taxes" (Freking,
AP/Miami Herald
<http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/AP/story/875115.html> , 1/27).
Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) proposed an amendment that would have required
families with annual incomes greater than 200% of the federal poverty
level to contribute a portion of the cost of their SCHIP coverage
through an agreement with their state. The amendment stated that
beneficiaries could not be required to contribute more than 5% of their
income. DeMint said, "The main goal of this is to stop the people moving
from private plans ... to a government-sponsored plan," a phenomenon
known as "crowd out." The measure was voted down by a margin of 60-37
(Armstrong [1], CQ Today, 1/27). Additional Republican amendments are
expected to address issues such as documentation requirements for
immigrants enrolling in SCHIP and efforts to prevent children with
private insurance from dropping coverage to sign up for SCHIP, according
to a Republican aide (CongressDaily, 1/28).	
Prospects	
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said he had no plans to file
cloture on the bill, which would end debate and bring about a vote.
Stephen Krupin, a spokesperson for Reid, said, "We're not at that point
in the process yet, but we hope to be able to move to a final vote by
the end of the week." Reid said that the Senate would spend most of its
time this week discussing the measure. He added, "I want to make sure
that everyone has an opportunity to offer any amendment that they want."
Democrats hope to pass the bill by the end of the week, triggering a
conference with the House and President Obama to join the two chambers'
bills into a single piece of legislation.	


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