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Compromise collapses in discussions over children’s health insurance plan
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President Bush waves as he walks back to the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on Thursday. Bush has promised to veto a federal children’s health insurance bill that the Senate passed Thursday.
Senate talks aimed at writing a compromise bill collapsed Thursday after GOP leaders refused to allow more time to negotiate.
Instead, the Senate voted 64-30 to pass a House-designed measure that President Bush has already promised to veto. The bill is nearly identical to legislation cleared by Congress, then vetoed by Bush last month.
The bill would increase the cost of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program from $25 billion to $60 billion over five years and expand the SCHIP rolls from 6 million children to 10 million. President Bush said the plan is too expensive and edges the program toward socialized health care.
Democrats said negotiations over a possible compromise were cut off by GOP leaders in the House and Senate.
“Republicans don’t want a deal,” said Brendan Daly, spokesman for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
Republicans called those charges “ridiculous,” saying they sent legislative language and proposed changes to the Senate last night “and have not received any feedback whatsoever,” according to Kevin Smith, spokesman for House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio.
Those proposals included adding provisions that would exclude all adults from the program and ensure that children earning twice the federal poverty level are covered before those from families with higher incomes.
Republican leadership aides said compromise talks would continue, even though Democratic leaders have decided to move ahead with the House bill Bush opposes.
“If they are going to send veto-bait to the president and waste time, that’s poor decision-making,” said Don Stewart, spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Congress has been unable to come up with a new proposal because Bush keeps coming up with new objections.
“Whether it’s the president making up phony excuse after phony excuse to oppose SCHIP or Republican leaders repeatedly using procedural delays, it is obvious that there are some who will do anything to stand in the way of enacting this bill,” Reid said.
sferrechio@dcexaminer.com
Comments from Examiner Readers
6:09 AM MST on Thu., Oct. 4, 2007 re: "Democrats move to override veto of children’s health care measure"
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Art B said:
Bush is right. The social security entitlement is broke. The medicare entitlement is broke. So lets create another one, which will soon be broke. We never hear anything about how much this will cost (clue -- lots). There arent enough smokers to pay for it and even if there were, what did they do to deserve this kind of punishment? How many non-payers will get "equal" benefits (I suppose they consider "parents" income to decide who pays, since ALL children are not able to pay by definition). The principal of all govt aid is that the more you "have", the less you "get". So to "get" the most, you need to appear to "have" nothing. What incentive is there for folks to get an education, work hard, and save their money for a better life if its just going to be taken from them and given to folks who have not done these things? Communism 101.
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