Democrats: cover legal immigrants in Obamacare, give illegal aliens access (Honda, NCLR

Stephen Dinan of the Washington Times offers "Liberals seek health-care access for illegals":

Fearful that they're losing ground on immigration and health care, a group of House Democrats is pushing back and arguing that any health care bill should extend to all legal immigrants and allow illegal immigrants some access.

..."Legal permanent residents should be able to purchase their plans, and they should also be eligible for subsidies if they need it. Undocumented, if they can afford it, should be able to buy their own private plans [even on the proposed Exchange]. It keeps them out of the emergency room," said Rep. Michael M. Honda, California Democrat and chairman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus...

Mr. Honda told The Washington Times that he's not pushing for illegal immigrants to gain access to taxpayer-subsidized benefits. "That's an argument that's been done already," he said.

The two letters are at house.gov/apps/list/press/ca15_honda/Health_090923.html however I wasn't able to find a list of those signing on; if anyone can do that leave a comment.

The article also mentions this:

The National Council of La Raza launched its own "flood their voice mail" campaign last week to put pressure on (Sen. Max Baucus) to expand coverage in his proposal to include all legal immigrants and to drop verification language in the legislation that would prevent illegal immigrants from obtaining coverage.

Mon, 09/28/2009 - 11:40 · · Importance: 4