WASHINGTON – U.S. Representative Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo., issued the following statement regarding the Democrat plan to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP):

“SCHIP was created to ensure that children in low-income families have access to high quality, affordable health care,” Lummis said. “In Wyoming, our version of the program successfully covers more than 5,600 low-income children responsibly. Unfortunately, the Democrat bill hijacks a highly successful program for low-income children and turns it into a new massive entitlement.”

“The Democrat plan will redistribute the funding we need to cover low-income children, giving it to families in New York making more than $84,000 and potentially even illegal immigrants.

“The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the bill will cause 2.4 million individuals to drop private coverage and move to government coverage, inching us closer to the Democrats’ vision of universal, government-provided healthcare.

“To make matters worse, Democrats have decided to pay for this massive SCHIP expansion with tens of billions of dollars in additional tobacco taxes.

“But with the number of smokers on the decline, even this is not enough to pay for the program. Four years from now, program funding will be cut by more than 60 percent under the Democrat plan.

“Short of finding 22.4 million new smokers, Democrats will be forced to either kick millions of children off of health insurance or raise taxes on all of us by tens of billions of dollars.

“It is irresponsible to run a children’s health program off a funding cliff. We cannot treat our nation’s children like a house that we abandon when we can no longer afford to make payments.

“I urge the Congress to pass responsible legislation that is consistent with the original intent of the SCHIP program – helping the children of the working poor.”