Health care workers joined community and faith leaders today on the Capitol steps in St. Paul to demand Republicans in Congress walk back historic cuts to Medicaid included in their budget bill, which President Trump wants on his desk by July 4.
Meanwhile, a new analysis from the AFL-CIO warns those cuts will make health care less affordable not just for the 7.8 million people projected to lose their benefits, but also for the 179 million Americans with employer-sponsored health coverage – by as much as $485 annually per person.
That’s because, experts say, people without insurance still get sick, but they are more likely to show up in urgent-care clinics and emergency rooms, driving up costs across the health care system.
“They’re going to go without care until they have to show up to the hospitals that are required to provide that emergency care,” Jessica Intermill, an activist with Protect Our Care Minnesota, said. “But if this big, bad-for-Americans bill passes, those hospitals and doctors won’t get paid for their work.
“You can’t stop paying for $700 billion worth of care in the United States without a catastrophic impact.”
That’s the amount by which the House version of the bill, passed last month, would cut Medicaid. A Senate version that cleared a key committee hurdle earlier this week would make even deeper cuts, forcing difficult decisions onto hospitals and state governments in order to close the gap.
The Walz administration projects that Minnesota will lose about $500 million in Medicaid funding annually under the GOP budget.
The state’s Medicaid director, John Connolly, said the bill advancing through the Senate would be “even worse,” with new paperwork requirements and other administrative hurdles that will make it harder for eligible people to access – and maintain – benefits.
“Disenrollment,” Connolly added, is very much the point of the legislation, which aims to “shrink the number of people with Medicaid coverage, regardless of their need or eligibility status.”
In addition to making health care less affordable, the Republican budget is likely to spark widespread job losses as states and hospitals look to absorb the loss of federal funds.
More than 600,000 front-line health care workers could be fired, the AFL-CIO analysis found, and funding for other state-budget priorities, like schools, public safety and infrastructure projects, could be in jeopardy.
If there’s good news to be found in the Republicans’ so-called “big, beautiful bill,” it comes for corporations and the wealthiest Americans, who will overwhelmingly benefit from the $3.7 trillion tax cut paid for by slashing Medicaid and food assistance.
“There is nothing beautiful about this bill,” said Rachel Anderson, a member of the Minnesota Nurses Association who works at Fairview Southdale. “And there is one big reason why nurses oppose it: Medicaid cuts kill people.”
— Michael Moore, UA editor
