Sharon Johnson of WE.News says (bold and italics mine)
A bill under contention in Nebraska proposes joining 14 states and the District of Columbia in providing prenatal care for all pregnant, low-income women regardless of immigrant status under CHIP, the children’s health insurance program.
It is authored by Republican Sen. Kathy Campbell, a long-time advocate for women and children, who says the bill is “morally right because all children deserve to be born healthy.” Republican Gov. Dave Heineman opposes it, saying taxpayer-funded benefits should not reach people without legal citizenship.
Oddly, in 2006 the Nebraska Right to Life Political Action Committee aggressively endorsed Gov. Heineman’s reelection, saying abortion-rights opponents “got more action in 15 months from Heineman than we did out of [previous governor] Johanns in six years.”
And by “oddly,” in this case, I mean that the Nebraska Right to Life PAC steadfastedly supports the bill Heineman’s threatening to veto. In direct violation of blogger protocol (we’re supposed to just sit in our pajamas in our mom’s basements) I called them to ask. The woman who answered said NRTL believes strongly in prenatal care for everyone regardless of status.
Whatever else one might say about any organization opposed to reproductive rights one can say that at least on this issue NRTL has a consistent position. Whatever else one can say about Heineman, he clearly doesn’t.
And it’s not just about the choice issue that he’s being inconsistent by the way. He can’t claim this is about his nominal conservative principle of “States Rights.” The bill is a Nebraska initiative to restore a program that was cut from this year’s Medicare legislation. He can’t claim this is about his nominal conservative principle of “fiscal responsibility” either. By replacing Medicare funds with CHIP, which has more generous reimbursement rates, the bill would save Nebraska taxpayers almost $4 million a year.
Instead, like Congressman Bart Stupak, Heineman’s position is pure, gratuitous Teabagging.
Via Matthew Yglesias,
Not sure if people is your
Submitted by chingona (not verified) on Mon, 2010-03-15 10:48.Not sure if people is your bold or the bolding of the OP, but … these fetuses, when born, will be legal, natural-born citizens. Medicaid-eligible citizens.
So if, as we’re always hearing, fetuses are actually people, he should be in the clear with taxpayer funds going only to support people with legal citizenship.
And if these babies are born early and sick because their mothers didn’t get care, we’re paying the NICU bill one way or the other.
[“So if, as we’re always hearing, fetuses are actually people, he should be in the clear with taxpayer funds going only to support people with legal citizenship.” Exactly, Chingona. A couple of quotes suggest he sees it entirely in terms of care being received by “illegal” women, which goes exactly against… well… most nominal pro-life theories about the autonomy, independence, and even citizenship of fetuses. The guy just wants to hurt people. When he can hurt women by claiming to be acting in the interest of “the unborn” he’ll do that. When it’s more convenient to hurt them by ignoring “the unborn” he’ll do that instead. It’s a problem for people with no principle to mistake power (i.e. the ability to commit violence or withhold safety) for authority. Thanks, Chingona. —fl]