Today, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a short-term funding bill to keep the government open for business while the House, Senate and White House attempt to find a way forward on the FY2014 Continuing Resolution. Yes, FY2014 begins October 1 so there’s not much time to spare on enactment of this legislation.  The House majority saw this must pass measure as another opportunity to undermine the Affordable Care Act.  This time, their goal is to defund the ACA.  One victim of this sledge-hammer approach is the extremely popular Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), which has historically enjoyed strong bipartisan support.

According to our colleagues at First Focus, the measure guts the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) by 70 percent, or just over $13 billion, starting October 1.

CHIP, along with its more comprehensive companion Medicaid, were around before the ACA, working in concert to bring the rate of uninsured kids to all time lows as we saw earlier this week with the release of the new Census data. After CHIP’s 2009 reauthorization, the 2010 health reform law extended the program to 2015 to ensure children continued to receive stable, consistent health coverage during a time of fast-paced transition to the new world of health coverage.

This measure would reverse progress the U.S. has made in covering kids– likely an unintended consequence of the politicization of the ACA when one considers the historic bipartisan support for covering kids. But who knows? Maybe some of those voting yes don’t think the government should support children’s access to health insurance. Of course, it’s unlikely the Senate will support such a dramatic attempt to undercut health coverage for kids and their families, but whether this  is an intentional or unintentional byproduct of the House’s action, the public needs to know.