Thread: Democrats turn immigrant health care debate on Republicans

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... e=politics

Democrats turn immigrant health care debate on Republicans
- By AARON C. DAVIS, Associated Press Writer
Monday, June 19, 2006


(06-19) 18:21 PDT SACRAMENTO, (AP) --

Democratic lawmakers have given up an attempt to add health care for hundreds of thousands of children, including illegal immigrants, to the state budget bill, removing one obstacle to agreement on the spending plan.

But the move still leaves a rift between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and lawmakers in his own party over children's health care that could further delay a budget.

Republican legislators have opposed both the Democrats' health care plan and a more modest proposal by Schwarzenegger to reimburse counties $23 million for 87,000 kids they now cover.

The fight over the broader expansion — which could cost $300 million a year — had overshadowed Republicans' problems with the governor's plan, which would also cover children of illegal immigrants.

"We're supporting the governor's position," Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata told the Sacramento Press Club on Monday. "This is about children. This should not be a chess piece in this budget game."

The Oakland Democrat said Democrats would introduce a separate bill to vote on their proposal, which would expand the state's Healthy Families program to cover children in families making up to 300 percent of the poverty level, including illegal immigrants.

The current cutoff is 250 percent of the property level.

By separating their proposal from the budget debate, Democrats attempted to position themselves as the ones ready to move forward on a $131 billion budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1. Republicans, they said, are now the ones out of step.

Senate Republican leader Dick Ackerman said that wasn't the case. The health care debate, he said, is just one issue holding up the budget. Republicans and Democrats have yet to reach consensus on paying down state debt, allocating education dollars and funding public safety programs, he said.

But Ackerman acknowledged the governor's proposed health care plan poses a challenge.

"Last time we talked about it in caucus, I didn't see anyone supporting it," Ackerman said.

H.D. Palmer, spokesman for the governor's Department of Finance, downplayed the difference between Republican lawmakers and the governor. He said the governor was pleased Democrats abandoned their health care proposal.

"The governor was opposed to that.... It represented a costly expansion of a costly state program," Palmer said. "Before we even think about expanding a program we should find those kids who are currently eligible and not enrolled."

More than 780,000 children in the state are enrolled in Healthy Families. According to estimates, at least 200,000 children are currently eligible but not enrolled.

Perata's announcement that Democrats had taken their children's health care expansion out of the budget debate seemed to surprise lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

Ackerman, who had met with Perata and other leaders in closed-door negotiations last week said he had understood it was a "possibility" Democrats would take their proposal off the table, but didn't know they had decided to do so until Perata spoke Monday.

Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, D-Los Angeles, who has been passionate in his defense of the plan, declined to comment on Perata's announcement.

When States start paying for illegals, in one way or another, and not enforce the laws to send them home....eventually they turn around and want money from the Feds....that means we are all paying for their lousy job of law enforcement...

That is not fair! Just because there are bad lawmakers in a State, we all shouldn't be forced to pay for these illegals!

"We're supporting the governor's position," Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata told the Sacramento Press Club on Monday. "This is about children. This should not be a chess piece in this budget game."

Once again it's all about the children when it comes to bending over and raping the taxpayers. That's just it, no thought to the taxpayers whatsoever. They wonder why it cause on average a million dollars to buy a home in CA. When the politicans start dipping in their own pockets to pay for this then maybe I'll start to take them a bit more seriously when they act like they are so compassionate.