SCHIP veto override attempt fails in House
An effort led by House Democrats to override a recent presidential veto of expanded funding for the SCHIP children's health insurance program has failed. The 273-156 vote in favor of the measure fell 13 votes shy of the two-thirds majority required in order to overcome President Bush's veto of the original legislation two weeks ago.
Not necessarily expecting a victory today, party leaders had stated earlier that they would remain staunchly committed to expanding funding for the program.
"There will be no compromise on 10 million children's health care," Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-IL), a member of House leadership, told CNN. "We won't go above it, but we ain't going below it."
"The American people support this issue because kids do not need to suffer for what is basically a broken health care system, and this provides those children with that health care," he continued.
Following the sustaining of the Bush veto today, Rep. Emanuel issued a statement criticizing Republicans who he said have "turned their backs" on children "from working families who are waiting for health care and whose families earn a paycheck, not a welfare check."
"Republicans told us today they are concerned about spending -- but I'm reminded they were willing to spend $680 billion in Iraq," he continued. "In the coming days, Democrats will not back down."
On Wednesday, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said that Democrats were "still in this fight."
Following today's defeat, Pelosi said that Democrats had nevertheless "advanced our cause in insuring 10 million children in America...in the next two weeks, we intend to send the president another bill."
The SCHIP bill was supported by 45 Republicans in the House when first passed, some 24 votes shy of what would have been required for a veto override today. Speaker Pelosi had hoped to "peel off" 14 Republican votes.
The measure would have provided for an increase of $35 billion for the program over the next five years.
During a press conference yesterday, President Bush pressed Democrats for compromise, saying he had "made clear that, if putting poor children first requires more than the 20 percent increase in funding I proposed, we'll work with Congress to find the money we need." The president previously proposed an increase of $5 billion for the program, an amount Democrats don't believe is adequate.
The original SCHIP funding bill, which passed the House and Senate last month -- only to be vetoed by president Bush -- sought to add four million more children to eligibility under the program, which currently provides for about 6 million children whose parents earn too much to qualify for Medicare but not enough to afford privately purchased health insurance.
House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) previously told the Associated Press that he believed the override attempt would fail, and that he wanted Democrats to come to the negotiating table about reauthorizing the insurance program.
"We will have the votes to sustain the president's veto," he said. "And I think the differences are resolvable, but we're standing on our principle that poor kids ought to come first."
The following video is from CNN's American Morning, broadcast on October 18, 2007.
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