Elijah Cummings: “for the second time we have overwhelmingly and on a bipartisan basis passed a bill to provide health insurance for 10…”

“for the second time we have overwhelmingly and on a bipartisan basis passed a bill to provide health insurance for 10 million American children by reauthorizing the State Children's Health Insurance Program. This legislation presents another opportunity for President Bush to show the American people that he values the well-being of our Nation's children. After all, the President has often said that he is a ``compassionate conservative.'' Well, he failed the first time, and I was hopeful that the House could override his ill-advised veto. But, unfortunately, we came up 13 votes short. So we are here again today passing a revised bill that sufficiently addresses the stated concerns of those who opposed the earlier bill. Those concerns really amount to little more than empty rhetoric. Rather than complain, House leadership compromised on phasing out health care insurance for childless adults from 2 years to 1 year. The bill we passed today clarified that CHIP will focus first on enrolling low-income children by capping the enrollment level at 300 percent of the poverty level, or $62,000 for a family of four. We also added language to clarify that CHIP does not cover illegal immigrants by requiring States to obtain further documentation of citizenship that cannot be confirmed by the Social Security Administration.”