[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 4 (Monday, January 8, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S61-S62]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                   CHIP and Community Health Centers

  Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, today marks a sad and, frankly, shocking 
day for too many of America's children and hard-working families 
because it has now been 100 days since funding for the Children's 
Health Insurance Program and community health centers expired.
  History has shown us that there is a whole lot that can get done in 
100 days. It took Thomas Jefferson only 17 days to write the 
Declaration of Independence; the brave allied forces who landed on D-
day advanced through France and liberated Paris in only 80 days; and 
Congress managed to pass 15 major pieces of legislation during 
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's first 100 days in office. Yet, 
here we are, 100 days past the deadline of September 30, and Congress 
still hasn't managed to pass long-term legislation to reauthorize what 
we call CHIP--the Children's Health Insurance Program--and to fund our 
community health centers.
  We have a strong bipartisan bill funding CHIP, which was passed out 
of committee. I give our chairman and ranking member kudos for working 
together. I was proud to work with them. It came out of committee with 
only one ``no'' vote and has waited and waited and waited on the floor 
of the Senate. Senator Blunt and I have a bipartisan bill to continue 
funding community health centers, and 70 Members of the Senate have 
signed a letter supporting long-term funding for community health 
centers, which expired September 30--100 days ago.
  Right now, we are in a situation where 9 million children and their 
parents don't know what is going to happen long term. As soon as this 
month, 100,000 children and their families in Michigan have begun to 
get letters saying that their children will lose coverage, and they are 
trying to figure out what is going on.
  Imagine being a parent who is working hard. A lot of folks I know are 
working two jobs, trying to hold it together. You don't have health 
insurance; you earn too much for your children to be able to get 
Medicaid health insurance, so the Children's Health Insurance Program 
is your lifeline. It is your lifeline. It gives you peace of mind to 
know that if your daughter falls and breaks her arm or your son gets a 
cough that won't go away, you can take them to the doctor.
  What if those children have something worse than a broken arm or a 
cough? What if they are diagnosed with type 1 diabetes or asthma or 
cancer? Just imagine being that parent and getting a letter which says 
that your child may no longer have health insurance. It is not 
necessary. This is not necessary.
  We could do this tomorrow. If we thought it was important enough to 
bring it to the floor, we could get a vote--and I believe it would be 
overwhelmingly bipartisan--tomorrow if

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there were a sense of urgency, an understanding, about how these 
parents feel and how these children feel.
  So what would you do if you got that letter? Would you tell your 
kids? You don't want them to worry about it. What would you do? I 
believe hard-working families--and we are talking about working 
families, people with jobs, working--deserve better.
  Then we have community health centers that serve 25 million people 
across the country, including 300,000 veterans and 7.5 million 
children. Our health centers are doing a phenomenal job. At more than 
260 sites across Michigan, our health centers are serving 681,000 
people, including about 13,000 Michigan veterans.
  This month, health centers that were supposed to receive a new 12-
month grant are only getting a small amount of funding to get them 
through the next few weeks, not knowing what is going to happen again. 
By June, Michigan's community health centers will lose over $80 million 
in funding, and over 99,000 patients will lose care.
  Last month, I had the opportunity to visit two of our great Michigan 
community health centers, each of their networks operating more than 
one site--Hamilton Community Health Network in Flint and Western Wayne 
Family Health Centers in Inkster. Like clinics across Michigan, these 
centers are serving literally thousands of Michigan families every 
day--people of Michigan who don't have medical care for one reason or 
another. Now those thousands of people are at risk of having no place 
to go if they get sick or if they need preventative care so that they 
don't get sick.
  Hamilton Community Health Network will run out of funding in April, 
and Western Wayne Family Health Centers will not get their full funding 
this month. They were asking me: Should they lay people off? How should 
they be planning for their centers? What should they be doing?
  That means 15,500 people are wondering what will happen to them if 
they or their children get sick or slip on the ice--which there is a 
lot of in Michigan--and sprain an ankle.
  Felicia knows what it is like to live under that cloud of fear. She 
wrote me a letter indicating that in 2011 she was an AmeriCorps 
volunteer serving in Lansing and didn't have health insurance. When she 
started feeling tired all the time and losing weight, she went to the 
Center for Family Health in Jackson, MI, another great center. The 
Center for Family Health, which served 29,000 patients in 2016, will 
run out of funding in March if we don't act.
  Felicia was diagnosed with stage 4 Hodgkin's lymphoma--pretty scary 
stuff. The Center for Family Health helped her get her health coverage 
through Medicaid and care from the University of Michigan, including 
chemotherapy and later a stem cell transplant.
  Felicia wrote me:

       Now I am feeling awesome, I am cancer-free, and I am 
     working part time while I am finishing up college. I feel 
     that I owe my life to the Center for Family Health.

  Felicia knows the importance of community health centers; one in 
Michigan saved her life. People like Felicia and children who are 
covered by the Children's Health Insurance Program, which we call 
MIChild in Michigan, shouldn't have to wait a day longer. They are 
counting on us to get this done. It has been 100 days of uncertainty 
that did not have to happen.

  Let me say that again. We have a bipartisan bill reported out of the 
Finance Committee. The House has reported their version. There is no 
reason we can't immediately put a 5-year extension on the floor of the 
Senate.
  Senator Blunt and I and our cosponsors of our bill have always 
assumed that once CHIP came to the floor, we would be adding in 
community health centers, for which there is strong support, and we 
would be able to get this done. People would know that their 
neighborhood health center is there. Their children can go to the 
doctor instead of sitting for hours in the emergency room. They would 
be able to see their doctor if they got sick. It has been 100 days 
since funding has expired for community health centers and children's 
health insurance. That is 100 days too many.
  I have been coming to the floor every week to say: Let's do it today. 
Let's do it tomorrow. We don't have to wait and hold them as bargaining 
chips in some bigger appropriations negotiation. These are families. 
These are kids. These are people who want to have confidence in us that 
we will do our jobs. This one can get done. It could have gotten done 
before the holidays. What a great Christmas present that would have 
been. It can get done now.
  On behalf of the 25 million people who use those community health 
centers, the 9 million children and their parents who use the 
Children's Health Insurance Program, I call on all of us to have the 
sense of urgency and the leadership--the leader--to bring this up. We 
can get it done in a day. We would all feel good about it because it 
would be something we would be doing together instead of having these 
families wait and wait.
  Mr. President, before yielding, I want to acknowledge our newest 
Senator, Mr. Jones, who is here, and thank him. Even as he was in his 
happiness, and rightly so, on the evening he found out he was going to 
be the next Senator, he mentioned CHIP. In listening to that acceptance 
speech, it did my heart good to know that children's health insurance 
was at the top of our newest Senator's mind at that important time, and 
it is a pleasure to see him on the floor this evening.
  I believe the Senator from Arizona is here.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.