Jay Rockefeller, West Virginia senator who helped create CHIP, dies at 89

John D. "Jay" Rockefeller IV, who represented West Virginia in the U.S. Senate for 30 years, died Friday at his home in Washington at age 89, according to a Reuters obituary carried by CNBC, which cited the Washington Post for the death.

From national service in rural West Virginia to five Senate terms

Reuters says Rockefeller was born June 18, 1937, weeks after the death of his great-grandfather, the oil magnate John D. Rockefeller. After Harvard he served in a national service program in rural West Virginia from 1964 to 1966, which Reuters describes as the turning point of his life. He was elected to the state legislature in 1966, became secretary of state in 1968, lost a run for governor in 1972, and won the governorship in 1976. In 1984 he was elected to the Senate, where he won five six-year terms before announcing in 2013 that he would not seek a sixth.

The health care record

Reuters credits him with a role in shaping the 1997 program under which the federal government helps states cover uninsured children, now known as the Children's Health Insurance Program. He backed President Bill Clinton's failed push for near-universal coverage in the 1990s and fought for the 2010 health care law under President Barack Obama. In that debate he unsuccessfully pressed for a government insurance option open to the general public alongside private plans.

CHIP is a state-run program, so eligibility and enrollment rules vary. Families and employers with questions can check with their own state Medicaid or CHIP office.

Iraq, coal and committees

Reuters notes he voted in 2002 for the Iraq war authorization, then said in 2004, "If I had known then what I know now, I would have voted against it." As chairman of the Senate intelligence committee he released a 2008 report concluding that Bush administration officials had exaggerated intelligence on Iraq. He also led the Commerce, Science and Transportation committee and the Veterans Affairs committee.

At home he generally backed West Virginia's coal and steel industries, but Reuters says he angered coal executives in 2012 by fighting Republican efforts to block regulation of emissions from coal-fired power plants. Reuters says he was married to public television executive Sharon Percy Rockefeller, with whom he had four children.

Sources: Reuters (via CNBC), Nov. 6, 2026. Funeral arrangements were not available in the sources we read.