Bill restores health insurance help for lawfully present immigrants
S. 5619 — Restoring Essential Plan Coverage Act · Filed by Chuck Schumer (D-NY) · 1 cosponsor · Introduced Sep 30, 2026 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill brings back money to help lawfully present immigrants pay for health insurance. A 2025 law had blocked this help. The bill makes a new rule for some low-income lawfully present immigrants. They can get help even without Medicaid. It lets states raise their Basic Health Program income limit. The limit goes from 200% to up to 250% of the poverty line.
Who it affects
Lawfully present immigrants and low-income people gain access to health insurance subsidies they lost. States get the choice to help more people.
One thing to notice
The bill works only if states choose to raise income limits. States must also have money to pay for it.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
1 cosponsor: 1 Democrats.
- Sep 30, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Sep 30, 2026 — Referred to Senate Committee on Finance · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Words to know
- lawfully present immigrants — People born in other countries with legal permission to live in the United States.
- Medicaid — A government health insurance program for low-income people and families.
- Basic Health Program — A state program offering affordable health insurance to people earning too much for Medicaid.
- poverty line — The income level the government sets to measure who is poor.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (2,061 characters) on Oct 8, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
As of — page rendered 2026-10-20.
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