CHIP, the Children’s Health Insurance Plan, has broad bipartisan support but is still being held in limbo as a political bargaining chip.

This leaves families all over the 8th District and all over this country uncertain about when their healthcare coverage may run out.

Patients and their families are anxious, especially those families with children who have chronic diseases.

The millions of families that rely on CHIP can’t wait any longer. Add your name to mine right now to call on Congress to reinstate CHIP immediately.

One of those victims is my patient Megan, who gives herself insulin shots and checks her blood sugar six times per day just like I did as a teen with type 1 diabetes. Without CHIP, her parents will need to pay $380 per month on supplies and insulin. They work hard for a living, but that type of extra expense is not affordable.

Medical expenses are the number one cause of bankruptcy in this country. The failure to fund CHIP puts more working families at risk. This is unacceptable.

CHIP passed with strong bipartisan support and should not be subject to political gamesmanship. The problem is that the Republicans want to fund CHIP, a $15 billion program, by pulling funds away from existing public health and medical care programs. That just doesn’t make sense at a time when they’ve just passed a tax bill with a gigantic $1.5 trillion “welfare check” to the wealthy and corporations.

Working families need help, not the 1%. It is time to fund CHIP.