Presidential Candidates Respond to Bush’s SCHIP Veto

by Seth Michaels, Oct 4, 2007

Now that Bush has vetoed legislation renewing and strengthening the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), the 2008 presidential candidates have come forward to have their say on the bill. 

The responses show the strikingly different visions of Republican and Democratic candidates on health care issues. Six Democratic candidates have spoken out strongly in favor of the bipartisan SCHIP legislation, which would ensure that the SCHIP program could cover an additional 4 million eligible children. In contrast, the leading Republican candidates support Bush’s veto. 

The candidates supporting passage of the children’s health bill include Sens. Joe Biden (D-Del.), Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.), as well as former Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) and Gov. Bill Richardson (D-N.M.).  

Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R-N.Y.), Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), former Gov. Mitt Romney (R-Mass.) and former Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.) all stand with Bush in opposing the SCHIP bill. 

(To show your support for children’s health care, sign our petition here.)

Below are presidential candidate statements on the battle for children’s health insurance. 

Richardson:

The Grinch came three months early this year and stole children’s health care. Unfortunately, this is no fairy tale, and unless Congress overrides the President’s veto, it will not have a happy ending.

President Bush’s veto is irresponsible. It is outrageous. It is simply immoral. Of the many shifting rationales the President has offered for vetoing this bill, one is that it will burden private insurance companies. That sums up everything we need to know about this President. Choosing between insurance companies and children should not be hard.

McCain:

McCain told CNN on Wednesday he agrees with President Bush’s veto of legislation expanding a children’s health insurance program, saying the bill provided a “phony smoke and mirrors way of paying for it.” 

“Right call by the president,” the Republican White House hopeful told CNN’s John King. “We’ve laid a debt on these same children…that we’re saying we’re going to give health insurance to.”

Edwards:

Today, we have witnessed a President that has turned his back on health care for children. Not surprisingly, in George Bush’s administration, corporate cronies and insurance industry allies always come first, while children’s health care comes last. In an America where nearly 9 million children don’t have health coverage, Congress must do what is right and fight for these children and override Bush’s cruel veto.

Even more shocking is that Republican Presidential candidates, including Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney are all lining up with President Bush and against health care for our children. Instead of threatening the health care of children, it’s time for Bush, and Republicans like McCain, Giuliani, and Romney to start picking on someone their own size.

Thompson:

According to The New York Times, Thompson has been “defending President Bush’s veto” on the campaign trail. The Kaiser Network quotes Thompson as saying:

It’s unfortunate that (members of Congress) pit people against one another….We’re on an unsustainable spending path in this country and no one seems willing to put the brakes on anywhere. 

Obama:

It is outrageous that the president has decided to use his fourth veto to deny health care to 4 million American children. At a time when we’re spending billions of dollars on a war that should never have been authorized and giving billions in tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans, today’s veto of this bipartisan plan shows a callousness of priorities that is offensive to the ideals we hold as Americans. But George Bush doesn’t have the last word, and I will keep fighting for the Republican votes needed to override his veto. As the wealthiest nation on earth, there is no reason we shouldn’t be able to cover every child.

Giuliani:

NBC News quoted Giuliani as supporting Bush’s veto, saying the SCHIP bill expanded coverage too broadly.

We’re going to take people off private insurance and put them on government insurance—that’s a disaster. 

Dodd: 

This President’s priorities are unconscionable. With the resources it takes to execute just over three months of the Iraq War, we could fully fund the expansion of health care for needy children that Bush vetoed. Indeed, today’s veto is another reminder that this war is not only adversely affecting our security but also adversely affecting our other top priorities, and it’s time for Congress to do what it must do to end it.

Romney:

The Kaiser Network noted that Romney also supports Bush’s veto. Romney said that he, too, would have vetoed the SCHIP bill. According to Romney, the bill

is a very expensive way to spend more money and not get us much down the track of getting everybody insured.

Biden: 

With one stroke of his pen, President Bush has denied health insurance to 3.8 million kids who were due to get it under this bipartisan expansion of the Children’s Health Insurance Program. He’s willing to spend billions and billions of dollars in Iraq, but he’s not willing to invest in our kids’ healthcare. It is unconscionable and wrong. Every child in this country should have health insurance. The President’s veto is a tragedy for the millions who don’t.

Clinton:

…first and foremost, we have to keep the existing program going, but we all believe that it is important to try to expand its coverage beyond the nearly 6 million that it covers now…it is just wrong for the president to threaten to veto this effort to expand the children’s health insurance program. So we’re going to do everything we can to pass this program. And if he wants to have part of his legacy be vetoing the child health insurance program then we’ll try to override the veto because this is absolutely an imperative. There are lots of examples of how children are not successful in school because they don’t have access to quality, affordable healthcare. I just think it’s outrageous and offensive that the President would threaten to veto this legislation.

Get more information about presidential candidates and their stance on health care at Working Families Vote 2008.

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