Representative Heather Wilson: “Ten years ago, the Children's Health Insurance Program passed with a Republican Congress and a Democratic President. Now…”

“Ten years ago, the Children's Health Insurance Program passed with a Republican Congress and a Democratic President. Now we are trying to reauthorize it with a Democratic Congress and a Republican President. We should be able to do this, and we should be able to do it in a bipartisan way. The Children's Health Insurance Program has reduced the number of uninsured children in this country and has given them access to primary care. They live healthier lives because of it. This is not a great bill, but it is a good bill; and I have supported this bill, and I encourage my colleagues to support it again today. In particular, it phases out the participation of adults in this program. This program is for kids, for low-income kids, not for adults. And successive administrations have been approving the admission of adults to the program, and that was not its intent. New Mexico in particular will benefit from this program because it allows lower income kids to be participants in the program. Because of an anomaly of the original law, New Mexico's lowest income kids are not eligible for this program. I would urge my colleagues to vote in favor of the bill today.”