Catholic Charities USA says Bush veto" imperils the health of the nation's children"

Social justice news
October 3, 2007

Catholic Charities USA says Bush veto"
imperils the health of the nation's children"
Alexandria, VA-Rev. Larry Snyder, president of Catholic Charities USA, called President Bush's veto of the extention and expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), a national program that provides health insurance coverage to poor children, "disappointing" in a statement released today. On October 3, Bush vetoed a compromise bill that had enjoyed strong bipartisan support in the Congress.

The $35 billion agreement would have provided health insurance coverage for the 6.6 million children currently enrolled in SCHIP, plus an additional 4 million. The proposal includes dental coverage and mental health parity, and it gives states the option to cover pregnant women, "protecting the health and preserving the life of unborn children," according to NETWORK, a Catholic lobby.

"It is dismaying that President Bush has followed through on his threat to use one of his extremely rare vetoes on a bill that would have helped so many children without health insurance," Snyder said. "Because of President Bush's veto, thousands of poor children living in every state will not receive health insurance coverage that would otherwise have been provided to them under this legislation. This veto puts the health of many of our nation's children at risk.

"This veto is the wrong decision at the wrong time. Census figures released only a few weeks ago showed that the number of children in America without health insurance is going up—reaching 8.7 million in 2006—and this legislation would have taken an important step in reducing that number by extending health insurance coverage to several million more poor children."

The Senate passed the SCHIP compromise bill on Thursday, September 27, by a vote of 67 to 29. Although this was a large enought margin to override a presidential veto, the Senate might not get the bill back since vetoed bills are returned first to the chamber where they originated, in this case the House. The House passed the SCHIP compromise bill by a margin of 265-159 on September 25. That vote was 19 short of what is needed to override President Bush’s expected veto.

On September 25, President Bush issued a written statement saying the bill “goes too far toward federalizing health care and turns a program meant to help low-income children into one that covers children in some households with incomes of up to $83,000 a year.” According to NETWORK, a Catholic lobby, the figure the president is using is greatly inflated.

"When Catholic Charities launched its Campaign to Reduce Poverty in America earlier this year with the goal of cutting the poverty rate in half by 2020," said Snyder, "we understood that the journey would be long and difficult. Passage of the children's health insurance bill would have been an important milestone to show that Congress and the White House were finally giving priority to the needs of those living in poverty. Instead, today's disappointing veto shows that we must redouble our efforts to help the poorest and most vulnerable in our society."

"It is clearly not just or humane to reduce a program that provides health insurance to children, the number of whom is growing," said Joyce Campbell, irector of community and government relations for Catholic Charities of Trenton, New Jersey. "It is unreasonable to think that at a time when we know housing costs are going up and many working poor families are housing burdened, that there would be an expectation that they could afford to pay for health insurance. The president's [veto of] SCHIP would leave an additional 28,000 children in New Jersey without health care. The pieces just don't fit together. And that's what those living day to day, paycheck to paycheck tell us at Catholic Charities."

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