Children’s Health Insurance Program

Even as the state faces a potential recession and changes to the federal tax code, California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) made significant investments in the state’s child welfare and juvenile justice systems in the first version of the state’s 2018-2019 budget.

Despite new indications that renewing the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) could actually save the federal government money, Congress has yet to pass a reauthorization of the program. Nearly 1.7 million out of the 9 million children served by CHIP each year could lose healthcare coverage by the end of February if Congress fails to pass legislation to reauthorize the program, according to a new report from Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families.

Both chambers of Congress will likely move on a Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) bill tomorrow, setting up what advocates hope will be a quick process to finish the already-overdue reauthorization process.

The U.S. Border Patrol will have intercepted an estimated 90,000 children without any sort of legal protective status by the end of 2016. These are mostly traumatized children who are fleeing violence in their home countries, often without an adult.