[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 4 (Monday, January 8, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S50-S51]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                  Children's Health Insurance Program

  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I come to the floor this afternoon to mark 
a milestone no Senator can be proud of and a milestone every Senator 
should regret. That milestone is, it has now been 100 days since the 
Congress failed to extend full funding for the Children's Health 
Insurance Program. The Congress has always looked at this in a 
bipartisan way. This is for the millions of families, for kids who walk 
an economic tightrope with their families, the families who balance the 
rent bill against the fuel bill and the fuel bill against the grocery 
bill.
  I have to say, there was plenty of time in the last Congress to carry 
out the priorities of the multinational corporations. The people who 
are well connected, the people who are powerful received permanent, 
substantial, really massive new tax breaks, and yet the 9 million kids, 
including 80,000 in my home State who count on CHIP to stay healthy--
what they received was a patch. They received something temporary. They 
received something that didn't resemble the permanent, you-can-count-
on-it tax relief the multinational corporations were celebrating at the 
end of the year. It is a sad statement about the priorities of the 
Congress at the end of last year and one I hope we will move now in the 
bipartisan tradition of this program to pass on a permanent basis.
  The CHIP program was created in 1997 through a simple idea: No child, 
regardless of their income, family's status, or geography should go 
without quality, affordable healthcare. It serves families who make too 
much to qualify for Medicaid but also don't have access to affordable 
healthcare through their employer. A lot of these families go back and 
forth between CHIP and Medicaid, depending on whether a spouse is out 
of work.
  CHIP covers all kinds of essential healthcare for kids from 
preventive services to dental checkups, to treatment for serious 
illnesses. For families across the country, that is peace of mind, that 
is the chance to go to bed at night knowing you aren't going to get 
crushed by big medical bills in the morning. It means you don't have to 
have those heartbreaking, right-before-bed conversations about what you 
are going to do for your sick child, and it doesn't mean you have to 
just plan on the unexpected emergencies with nowhere to turn. All of 
that is at risk because of the ``negligence'' of this Congress, and I 
use that word specifically.
  I talked about the skewed priorities at the end of the year, but 
right now States are stretching their Children's Health Insurance 
Program dollars to the breaking point. They are trying to make sure 
kids stay covered, and what we are faced with is termination notices 
going out. We have to prevent those termination notices for these 
families. As I said, Congress put a patch on all this, contrasting this 
to the permanent relief of the multinationals, and the Congress sent a 
small amount of money to the States to keep them afloat, but make no 
mistake about it, it is not going to be long before bedlam sets in, 
once again, and there are real consequences for children and families.
  Now, I also want to note that I have been working closely with 
Chairman Hatch for months now to get CHIP across the finish line. 
Chairman Hatch knows what it takes. He created this program with our 
friend Senator Rockefeller and the late, great Senator Kennedy. They 
demonstrated that kids' health was an issue that transcends ideological 
lines, and our country is the better for it today.
  Chairman Hatch and I made an agreement in September that extends full 
funding for 5 years, affirms key protections for kids and their 
families, and gives States certainty they can

[[Page S51]]

count on to plan their budgets. I note that the leader, Senator 
Schumer, is here. He has been very supportive of this bill. He sat next 
to me and Senator Rockefeller for years and is supportive of the 
children's health program.
  The Hatch-Wyden bill passed with a strong bipartisan vote in the 
Finance Committee. Again, I am highlighting the priorities where there 
was time for the multinational corporations to get that permanent 
relief, but there wasn't any time to put the CHIP bill--one that had 
only one vote in opposition in the Finance Committee--on the Senate 
floor. In the House of Representatives, they weren't pursuing it like 
we did in the Finance Committee. They never could get past a purely 
partisan approach, out of line with CHIP's long, bipartisan history.
  Now, obviously after months of delay, it is time to act, and I want 
to wrap up with a quick comment about what is going to happen if you 
don't move and move quickly. Just last week, the Congressional Budget 
Office announced that the cost of CHIP has plummeted from $8.2 billion 
to $800 million. That is because premiums in the individual market are 
set to skyrocket after the repeal of the Affordable Care Act's coverage 
requirement in the Republican tax bill. Many of the families who 
currently count on CHIP will have to get their kids' healthcare on the 
private market at a higher cost. As if Congress needed more reasons to 
act, the budget office has demonstrated what is now at stake for kids 
and their families who are counting on quick action for affordable 
healthcare.
  There is a long history, as I have noted, of the Senate working on 
the Children's Health Insurance Program in a bipartisan way. We started 
building on that tradition in the Finance Committee with virtual 
unanimity. Somehow at the end of the last Congress--and your priorities 
can always be illustrated with what you find time to do--there was time 
at the end of the year for the agenda of the multinational 
corporations, but there wasn't time for the youngsters and their 
families who walk an economic tightrope and depend every night, when 
they turn the lights out, on making sure there is a way to pay for 
healthcare if there is an emergency in the morning.
  I want it understood that we are working day in and day out now to 
quickly make sure kids and their families get the certainty and 
predictability they deserve. They deserve the kind of certainty the 
powerful got with the tax bill at the end of the year.
  So we are going to be on this floor until this critical legislation 
is passed. It needs to be passed quickly.
  I yield the floor.