By Jocelyn Guyer

Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) sent a letter to his colleague Senator Hatch (R-UT) last week outlining his grave concerns about Hatch’s recently introduced bill to repeal the stability protections (“or maintenance-of-effort requirement”) in Medicaid and CHIP.   The letter — the latest in a series of Rockefeller efforts to protect health programs for low-income people in the deficit reduction debate — expresses deep concern about 400,000 people losing Medicaid and CHIP if the Hatch bill is adopted, 2/3rds of whom would be children.  It reviews the long history of bipartisan support for CHIP and its incredible success, along with its companion Medicaid, in driving down the rate of uninsured children to the lowest level on record.  

On a more personal note, Senator Rockefeller expresses surprise that Senator Hatch, a leader on CHIP in the past, “would seek to advance a provision that would jeopardize the future of the Children’s Health Insurance Program.” 

If you’re a regular reader of Say Ahhh!, I’m sure we don’t have to tell you that we agree with Senator Rockefeller’s assessment that repealing the stability protections would create enormous issues for the nation’s children.  As he put it, “By repealing these provisions, this bill could jeopardize the country’s remarkable progress in covering children and unravel one of the Congress’s most successful bi-partisan initiatives.”