It was the shout heard ’round the world (at least the country) last night – when Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) shouted “you lie!” to President Obama during his speech on health care to a joint session of Congress. The disruption came when Obama addressed rumors that his proposed health care plan would grant coverage to illegal immigrants.
Let’s check the facts behind the issue.
Here’s what Obama said in his speech:
There are also those who claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants. This, too, is false – the reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.
It was after that statement that Wilson yelled out that Obama is a liar. The congressman later released a statement apologizing for his outburst, but holding firm that he disagreed with him.
From Wilson:
This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the President’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill. While I disagree with the President’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the President for this lack of civility.
This claim has actually been circulating around for some time, and it’s not true. Nonpartisan organizations like FactCheck and PolitiFact have consistently rated it as a lie.
H.R. 3200, the House health care proposal, actually contains a section entitled “No Federal Payment For Undocumented Aliens” that essentially says “there will be no federal funds spent to cover illegal immigrants.”
From PolitiFact:
We read all 1,000-plus pages of the health care bill and were struck by the fact that it is largely silent on health care for illegal immigrants. Keep in mind that experts estimated there were 6.8 million uninsured illegal immigrants in the United States in 2007, out of a total of 11.9 million illegal immigrants. Right now, most states have laws on the books that require hospitals to treat severely ill people who arrive at the hospital, regardless of immigration status, and we didn’t see anything that would change those laws, either.
Most illegal immigrants are also now excluded from Medicaid, the government-run health care for the poor. We didn’t see anything that would change that.
