Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said on Tuesday that the Children’s Health Insurance Program should be extended as part of the next must-pass spending bill.
“Congress has passed patches and fixes, but the time for short-term solutions for CHIP is over,” he said at the confirmation hearing for Health and Human Services nominee Alex Azar. “CHIP needs to be extended by Jan. 19, and I’m going to do all I can to make sure we get it done.”
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., the Senate Finance Committee’s ranking member, echoed Hatch’s urgency for long-term funding.
“We all understand that we’ve got to get this done and we’ve got to get it done quickly,” Wyden said.
CHIP expired on Sept. 30. The program gives block grants to states to provide insurance to low-income children.
States began running out of CHIP funding at the end of last year, but Congress included a short-term funding patch of nearly $3 billion.
The Senate Finance Committee approved its own five-year reauthorization bill for CHIP in October. However, CHIP funding has not advanced in Congress due to objections over funding.
The House passed a five-year reauthorization in November that funded CHIP by charging wealthy seniors higher Medicare premiums and raiding an Obamacare disease prevention fund.
Democrats balked at those funding offsets and the legislation has gone nowhere in the Senate.
