[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 200 (Wednesday, December 19, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Page S7914]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         TRIBUTE TO ORRIN HATCH

  Mr. CASEY. Mr. President, today I wish to pay tribute to my colleague 
Senator Orrin Hatch and his more than 40 years of public service. Only 
five U.S. Senators have served longer than Senator Hatch, and he is one 
of the few who have served as President Pro Tempore of the Senate, an 
honor given to the longest serving Member of the majority party. Some 
may not know this, but Orrin Hatch was born and raised in Pittsburgh, 
PA. He attended the University of Pittsburgh Law School and practiced 
law in the city before moving to Utah years before his election to the 
Senate.
  Senator Hatch has too many legislative accomplishments to list, but I 
will focus on one that is so important to our family, the Children's 
Health Insurance Program. Nelson Mandela once said, ``There can be no 
keener revelation of a society's soul than the way in which it treats 
its children.'' The Children's Health Insurance program, known by the 
acronym CHIP, is a prime example of when our Nation took an important 
step forward to care for our children. Senator Hatch worked with our 
former colleague Senator Ted Kennedy and others to ensure that children 
from low-income families who were not eligible for Medicaid had access 
to healthcare. CHIP holds a special place in my heart as well because 
my father, Governor Robert P. Casey, signed into law one of the first 
children's health insurance programs in the Nation in 1992. 
Pennsylvania's CHIP served as the model for the national program that 
today provides healthcare to nearly 10 million children.
  We will miss Senator Hatch here, but he leaves the Senate knowing 
that his work has positively impacted the lives of millions of 
Americans. We wish Senator Orrin Hatch well as he returns to Utah.

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