Pete Sessions: “included in the Medicare prescription drug reform bill in section 605 is a Medicaid reform of welfare benefits for…”

“included in the Medicare prescription drug reform bill in section 605 is a Medicaid reform of welfare benefits for noncitizens, reversing a policy adopted by this Senate in 1996 by a vote of 74 to 24. Section 605 is a very substantial change in our current policy. It will cost, according to CBO estimates, $500 million over just 3 years. It is not to be taken lightly. Frankly, we haven't had debate on it. I have offered an amendment that would strike the existing language in section 605, along with a sense of the Senate that this matter go back to the Finance Committee for hearings this fall, the time when the Finance Committee plans to be addressing Medicaid welfare reform. That is what this is. This is Medicaid welfare reform, not Medicare senior citizens reform. This is clearly unconnected to the purpose of the bill. It was slipped in as some sort of compromise. We ought not to allow that to happen, to erode a very important part of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act.”