The U. S. Senate renewed the State Children's Health Insurance Program SCHIP and authorized spending an added $32.8 billion to expand the health coverage program to include about 4 million more children, in a 66 to 32 vote. President Barack Obama is expected to sign the bill into a law by next week and this would for the first time include coverage for legal immigrants. This is the point over which SCHIP has met with opposition from the conservative Republican's who are against the option of states being able to cover children of legal immigrants, even if they are newly arrived in the country. SCHIP currently covers nearly 7 million kids who are unable to qualify for Medicaid as their family's incomes are too high to meet the requirements and yet don't earn enough to be able to afford private health insurance.

This would take President Obama one step closer to his campaign pledge of to cover all Americans with health insurance. Although even once this insurance comes into effect there would still be an estimated 5 million children without health insurance in the country and the government is working on plans of providing coverage to them.

The bill met with opposition from the tobacco industry which is not surprising as the funding for the expansion of SCHIP is to come from an increased cigarette tax which is to go up from 39 cents to $1 per pack. Their argument is that by raising the federal tax on cigarettes by as much as 61 cents a pack it would cost them jobs and take money out of the economy to subsidize federal health care. Former President George W. Bush vetoed expanded coverage in 2007 even though many Republicans supported the legislation using federalizing health care as an argument.

The U. S. House of Representatives passed a similar bill on January 14. President Barack Obama is expected to sign the bill into law.

Talking about SCHIP Sister Carol Keehan, president of the Catholic Health Association of the United States said, "We were told you've got to take care of Wall Street if you want to take care of Main Street. Well, Main Street can never be safe if their children don't have health care."