Pelosi: 'Passage of SCHIP Is a Monumental Achievement for Our Children and Our Country'

Pelosi: ‘Passage of SCHIP Is a Monumental Achievement for Our Children and Our Country’

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Contact:Brendan Daly/Nadeam Elshami, 202-226-7616

Washington, D.C. â€" Speaker Nancy Pelosi released the following statement today after the House voted unanimously to amend House rules for a resolution sponsored by Congressman John Tanner of Tennessee to require House committees to hold periodic hearings on waste, fraud, and abuse in government programs:

Below are the Speaker’s opening remarks:

"Good afternoon. This is indeed a happy day for us and we have some very special guests to celebrate with. Passage of the bipartisan children’s health insurance bill is a monumental achievement for our children, and for our country, and certainly for this Congress. With a strong bipartisan vote, the House brought us one step closer to providing 11 million children with health care.

"More than 80 percent of the American people support our bipartisan children’s health insurance bill because they care about the millions of American children who are currently without health care coverage. They understand that 2.6 million people lost their jobs last year â€" over 520,000 in the month of December alone. And each month now, until we have a recovery initiative enacted into law, 500,000 more people will lose their jobs.

"Ensuring that we have preventive care is more cost effective than relying on our nation’s emergency rooms. The bipartisan, fully paid for, children’s health insurance bill represents the New Direction that Democrats fought for in the last Congress. We couldn’t get President Bush’s signature even though we had bipartisan support in the House and Senate to vote for the bill.

"But this is only the beginning of the change we will achieve with our new President. We look forward to quick Senate action so that we may soon make this one of the first bills signed into law by our new President, Barack Obama.

"Many people made today possible â€" some of them inside the Congress with their leadership and their persuasion, others of them outside. I want to acknowledge my colleagues who are here and as a resource as we have our question and answer session. The Dean of the Congress of the United States, Congressman John Dingell who has been on this a very long time as Chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Chairman Charlie Rangel of the Ways and Means Committee, and members of the leadership Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro and Congressman Xavier Becerra.

"On the Committee, women played a very important role in this legislation â€" Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky from Illinois and Congresswoman Diana DeGette, who has championed this bill for a very long time. And I wanted to acknowledge another member of the leadership â€" Congressman Chris Van Hollen, who worked very hard on this as well. John Larson is the Chair of our Caucus and he made this a priority for us. That’s why under the leadership of Steny Hoyer, our majority leader, we were able to bring this legislation to the floor practically within one week of the new Congress coming into session. That’s the high priority that we placed on it.

"Our colleagues here are resources when we come to the Q and A, but we are actually going to hear from our very special guests. The first one we will hear from is Miss Treena Campbell who is here with Ashley, her daughter, who is 14, and Terra, who is 15 years old."