Some GOP Governors Fight to Keep ObamaCare’s Medicaid Expansion
Full repeal or “roll back parts of ObamaCare”?
The ObamaCare Medicaid expansion is a horrible deal for low income Americans; it’s also where a large number of “newly covered” Americans get their new coverage.
Not only does the expansion include “automatic” enrollment in Medicaid through ObamaCare even if it’s not wanted, but expanding Medicaid to slightly higher income levels includes many who have managed to acquire a home or other assets. Their home and assets, however, go to pay for their Medicaid bills after they die. In essence, then, Medicaid functions as a loan from the federal government just as it always has, but because the income level has been raised, more Medicaid recipients than ever will have their assets seized to cover the cost of their Medicaid expenses.
Despite this, some GOP governors are fighting their own party to keep the Medicaid expansion in their states.
Republican governors who reaped the benefits of Obamacare now find themselves in an untenable position — fighting GOP lawmakers in Washington to protect their states’ health coverage.
. . . . President-elect Donald Trump heaped more pressure on lawmakers to find a resolution of the issue this week when he vowed to “repeal and replace Obamacare essentially simultaneously” after the Senate confirms Rep. Tom Price, his pick for Health and Human Services secretary.
But Trump’s push comes as at least five of the 16 Republican governors of states that took federal money to expand Medicaid are advocating to keep it or warning GOP leaders of disastrous consequences if the law is repealed without a replacement that keeps millions of people covered. They include Govs. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts, Rick Snyderof Michigan, John Kasichof Ohio, Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas and Brian Sandovalof Nevada.
The governors explain why they want to keep the Medicaid expansion in their states.
Politco continues:
“We are now able to provide health insurance to 700,000 people,” said Kasich, who circumvented his state Legislature to enact expansion in 2013 and who was the sole GOP presidential candidate in 2016 to defend that portion of Obamacare.
“Let’s just say they just got rid of it, didn’t replace it with anything,” he said. “What happens to the 700,000 people? What happens to drug treatment? What happens to mental health counseling? What happens to these people who have very high cholesterol and are victims from a heart attack? What happens to them?”
Arkansas’ Hutchinson told House GOP leaders Wednesday that he wants to keep Obamacare’s federal funding boost for expanded Medicaid — but have more flexibility to run the program as he’d like.
Michigan’s Snyder says he defended his state’s Medicaid expansion to Trump’s team and the state’s congressional delegation.
“Massachusetts believes strongly in health care coverage for its residents,” Baker wrote in a letter to House Republican leadership on Wednesday.
And Nevada’s Sandoval, in a letter that outlined at great length how Obamacare has benefited his state, warned Republicans about gutting the law.
“You must ensure that individuals, families, children, aged, blind, disabled and mentally ill are not suddenly left without the care they need to live healthy, productive lives,” Sandoval said.
Part of Kasich’s argument is that the federal taxpayer dollars his state gets for Medicaid expansion is “our money,” that of Ohioans.
Hot Air explains this is not exactly the case:
Expanding Medicaid, Kasich has said, allowed him to “bring Ohio money back home,” preventing other states from getting $13 billion of “Ohioans’ federal tax dollars” in the first seven years. He circumvented a legislative ban on Obamacare expansion, waving off concerns about the cost with appeals to his experience in Congress in the ’90s.
In just three years, Kasich’s Obamacare expansion cost $11.3 billion, and not a penny of that new federal spending was “Ohio money” that would have otherwise gone to another state.
It’s not clear what President-elect Trump or the GOP Congress plan to do with or about the ObamaCare Medicaid expansion should they indeed succeed in repealing the entire law rather than picking and choosing what parts to to keep and what to “roll back.”
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6_lOqiRvCw
The RIGHT ANGLE boys discuss just how easily ObamaDoggle can…and should…be replaced.
Pay particular attention to the points made about how free markets work…so surpassingly well…whenever you let them, and how simple letting them work really is.
“Simple” is not “easy”. It often takes considerable moral courage to effect.
I wish that I could be optimistic about T-rump’s repeal vision, along with those of the GOP.
I’m not.
Without progress characterized by Revitalization, Rehabilitation, and Reconciliation; and with adventures in social justice (e.g. progressive wars) and immigration reform (e.g. refugee crises); establishment of monopolies and practices; realistically, they don’t have a choice to forego federal funding. Only the federal government can create money by pulling it out of the twilight zone (a.k.a. penumbra) and call it wealth… call it good.
Kasich is no idiot, he loves helping the people of Ohio with money taken from people in Iowa. If Ohioans like it, he gets reelected; it’s a win-win as far as he’s concerned.
And his daddy was a mailman.
Another rino bozo gumming up the works.
Well, you could replace this part of Obamacare with block grants to all the states to fund healthcare for poor citizens. The ultimate goal would be to eliminate Medicaid entirely by expanding these block grants.
Fuzzy Slippers is mistaken. I am an expert regarding the post death recovery of Medicaid. Most individuals that have received Medicaid as part of the Medicaid expansion are not going to have to pay back their benefits because they are under 55 years of age. Those over 65 are on Medicare. The limited population between 55 and 65 can easily avoid Medicaid estate recovery through one of the many loopholes in the program.
Why is Mass bitching? Don’t they have the perfect government controlled health insurance as a result of Romney?
Well, first if Mass is like Oregon, (surprise) the number of new people that signed up for the free Medicaid was twice the original estimates.
Second, the feds were paying 100% of the cost of the new Medicaid recipients. Starting in 2017 that is being phased out and my recollection is the states have to pay 5% of the cost for these new Medicaid recipients.
Oregon is facing a $1.7 billion budget hole for a state with about 4 million people. Of the $1.7 billion about $800 million is because of the Medicaid expansion.
1 in 4 Oregonians is receiving some form of welfare.
The government is not going to give back power it has seized. Obamacare may go away, but government control of the health care is here to stay, just with a different title. The tax and spend, big government crowd will see to it.
Full repeal! The feds have proven time and time again that they can’t run the various welfare programs they’ve created over the decades with anything resembling effiency and collectively are the biggest drivers of our debt! Rejecting in full the latest one needs to be done in order to signal that the American people are not going to put up with being saddled with more of these huge burdens being placed on us!
One other thing I would like to see along with full repeal would be a constitutional amendment limiting or preventing congress from interpreting the commerce clause in such a manner as allowing them to force us to engage in commerce rather than regulating what commerce we choose to engage in. That whole purchase insurance or pay a penalty aspect of Obamacare is still one of the most dangerous parts of the whole rotten deal for the dangerous precedent it set. Rejecting the notion that Congress has the power and authority to force us to purchase a product or service is every bit as important as getting rid of Obamacare!
Yeeeeeup…
But the Commerce Clause needs to be clarified entirely. Take it back to the meaning everyone knew BEFORE it was perverted by the Collectivists. It ONLY has to do with commerce between the states and with foreign sovereigns, not INTRAstate commerce. Certainly not every interaction between people or by individuals that could irrationally be said to impact the national economy. Because that gets you to the problem of abstention, and outlawing that (thus making “buying” mandatory).
Going back to that interpretation would certainly help constrain big government spending programs. If the people aren’t enamored of a certain program or activity they could through carefully managing their own funds and where and with whom they shop starve the feds of funds needed for what they want to do.
The Left is “smart” in that once you give somebody something, you can’t take it away or you become the villain. Proper messaging and independence from the gov-will-give-me-everything-I-need mentality would certainly go a long ways.