- Bill to Rescue Children's Health Program Hits Snag in House The New York Times by Robert Pear — Legislation to rescue the Children's Health Insurance Program sailed through a Senate committee on Wednesday, but touched off a partisan conflict in the House, diminishing hopes that the popular program would be quickly refinanced. Funding for the program expired on Sunday, and state officials said they would soon start notifying families that children could lose coverage if Congress did not provide additional money. It was impossible to say when Congress might pass a bill and send it to President Trump.
- States Scramble to Overcome Congress' Failure to Move on CHIP Stateline by Michael Ollove — By failing to reauthorize the Children's Health Insurance Program before last week's deadline, Congress has nudged the state of Minnesota toward a painful solution to the loss of federal funds: Unless it can find $95 million, the state said it will continue to provide full health care for certain low-income pregnant women in the program, while either reducing the number of children eligible for CHIP or scaling back their benefits. That is the sort of agonizing choice that all states in the country will face in the coming months unless Congress acts quickly to restore federal funding to a program that is immensely popular with both parties. With the U.S. Senate distracted last month by another Hail Mary attempt by Republicans to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, Congress didn't get around to reauthorizing CHIP by the Sept. 30 deadline. And that has left states contemplating how to keep the program running when the federal funding runs out — if they can keep it going at all.