"Legal Immigrant Children's Health Improvement Act" (Lincoln Diaz-Balart, NCLR, SCHIP)

Rep. Lincoln Diaz Balart has introduced "Legal Immigrant Children's Health Improvement Act of 2009" ("LICHIA", HR319, H.R.319, link) which would add coverage for immigrant children and pregnant women to the SCHIP bill. Legal immigrants aren't able to obtain those benefits for five years. Note also that apparently the current SCHIP reauthorization bill includes a similar provision, at least in the House version.

On Wednesday of last week, a press conference in support of those benefits was held in Washington DC featuring Janet Murguia from the National Council of La Raza, MALDEF, the League of United Latin American Citizens, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, and apparently some lawmakers (link). Their comments - and my comments - follow.

Muguia:

"It is inexcusable that Latino children, who make up a significant portion our nation's population, continue to be the most uninsured ethnic group in the country... Excluding legal immigrant children from this bill would result in an irresponsible and dangerous health care policy."

Sen. Bob Menendez said:

"I haven't met anyone who isn't outraged when they hear what the current five-year bar on legal immigrant children means: that a girl with asthma has to go through five years of attacks before she can get an inhaler, and a boy with cancer has to wait five years for chemotherapy... Five years truly is a lifetime for a child. It's time to remove this bar and include coverage for legal immigrant children and pregnant women in the bill to reauthorize SCHIP, so we can take a major step toward making sure no child goes to bed at night without health care in the greatest nation on earth."

Diaz-Balart:

"I have worked hard for a decade on this legislation, and I urge my colleagues in the Senate to follow the lead of the House and include ICHIA in SCHIP. The need for child health insurance coverage in states with large immigrant populations is reaching crisis proportions. The law should not discriminate against legal immigrants; health care is too important an issue."

Rep. Xavier Becerra:

"The five-year waiting period can mean the difference between preventing or treating health conditions that can affect a child's prospects for a healthy and productive life-or leaving those conditions undetected and not treated, costing taxpayers much more in the long run. This is not only a matter of common sense, but also an opportunity to show the values that define us as a country."

The goal of the five year ban isn't to harm children. It's to make sure that those who come here are able to take care of themselves, and most legal immigrants are supposed to have sponsors who'll be able to look after them in the cases described above. While extraordinary circumstances need to be addressed, we also need to avoid becoming a welfare office for the world. All those at the DC event are simply baby-waving: pretending this is about treating sick children when all they're really interested in is obtaining race-based power.

Comments

The so called schip is not about kids its about control and many so called adults will also be on this evil little plan, but what happens when mexico city comes-apart and we see 80 million kids and adults here? the money to take care of the kids of mexico and not your kids will be well over $800 billion per year! to start with and that will also be one of the reasons the so called USA Disappeared! its so much fun to watch a nation state do mass suicide! but how much more fun when people understand that all laws will disappear after the mass-suicide. ( ;-(

Lonewacko, Last year's SCHIPP bill failed in large part because the the Hispanic Caucus got their way and insisted that the legislation contained no Social Security ID / Visa matching whatsoever. The Democrats could have overridden Bush's veto if they had to. This year's bill is still weak on true safeguards against abuse and identity theft but it is a step in the right direction that has the Open Borders lobby's panties in a twist. In practice lots of hospitals with over following emergency rooms will be verifying SS ids after giving care and then attempting to file a claim against SCHIPP. Still it will help to flag the true health care costs of illegals. States like CA, NM, NV, TX and AR may to have make changes to continue to qualify for SCHIPP or risk losing the money, for other states it will just one argument to start cracking down on Open Borders insanity. Conservative Blue Dog Democratic districts in the Tobacco belt IN, KY, TN, NC, SC, GA and VA took a hit to finance the legislation on the condition that there was at least some safeguards against illegal aliens abusing the system. I think the real issue with "Legal Immigrant Children" is that lots of these kids are actually the "anchor babies" and alien spawn of visa overstays. In some cases the parents may have been issued an SSid, at other times just a visa number. The Open Border lobby of course knows this. Without a real id act and a true exit visa system that helps to flag overstays the 5 year moratorium is the best bet against abuse. Still I know honest American parents who, having lost good jobs that provided health care, thanks in part to the H1-B, are getting plowed under because of medical bills for their kids. Live in an area with lots of illegals and the out of pocket bills for medical bills can be two or three times higher than average. The SCHIPP expansion is overdue and will help prevent a number of bankruptcies. One last thing as much as the Hispanic Caucus insists Obama owes them everything. The truth is that most of seats the Democrats gained in 2006 and 2008 were in purple and Blue Dog districts. The rumors may be true that Obama has no intentions of wrecking his administration over Open Borders legislation. By this summer expect a dozen states to pass Arizona and Oklahoma style immigration enforcement bills. Count Indiana as one of them.

hope so to the above, but keep watching obama who needs control over the system and if he can't get what he wants he will do a job on people by opening the borders.