President Bush Renews Veto Threat Of SCHIP Expansion Legislation

August 14, 2007 – 11:56 am | posted in Medicare

President Bush on Wednesday restated his intention to veto legislation that would reauthorize and expand SCHIP, McClatchy/Contra Costa Times reports (Hall, McClatchy/Contra Costa Times, 8/9). Senate legislation, approved last week, would reauthorize SCHIP and increase the federal cigarette tax by 61 cents per pack to boost funding for the program by $35 billion over five years. The House version, also approved last week, would reduce payments to Medicare Advantage plans and increase the federal cigarette tax by 45 cents per pack to increase funding for SCHIP by $50 billion over five years. The House bill also would make a number of revisions to Medicare (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 8/6).

Bush has proposed a $5 billion increase over five years for SCHIP, which would raise the program’s total five-year funding to $30 billion (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 7/31). Bush in an interview said, “If SCHIP is used to expand the nationalization of health care, I will veto it.” The House and Senate versions must be reconciled before Bush can veto the measure (McClatchy/Contra Costa Times, 8/9).

Opinion Piece, Editorial

* Rep. Allyson Schwartz (D-Pa.), Philadelphia Daily News: Bush “has a choice” to “follow through with his callous threat to veto” SCHIP legislation, “compromising the health care of millions of children, or he can recognize that Congress is responding with a common-sense solution to meet the concerns of American families,” Schwartz writes in a Daily News opinion piece (Schwartz, Philadelphia Daily News, 8/9).

* Wall Street Journal: The “good news” in the debate over SCHIP “is that the House legislation is so egregious that it barely passed 225-204, and … Bush has promised to veto a major expansion of the SCHIP program,” according to a Journal editorial. It concludes, “Democrats think they have a political winner in the guise of helping ‘children,’ but the House bill shows that their higher priority is expanding government” (Wall Street Journal, 8/9).

Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery at http://www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/healthpolicy. The Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. © 2005 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.

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