First Read is a morning briefing from Meet
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political stories and why they matter.
The GOP's grand Obamacare experiment is about to begin
Perhaps the most significant consequence of
Republican Matt Bevin's victory in Kentucky's gubernatorial race last
night is that it could result in the dismantling of maybe the most
extensive (and successful) effort to implement Obamacare in the entire
country, as our colleague Perry Bacon writes.
And that would give national Republicans a statewide experiment to see
how -- or simply if -- you can rollback the law. Under Democratic Gov.
Steve Beshear, "Kentucky's uninsured rate declined over the last two
years from 14% to 9%, according to the United States Census Bureau, the
biggest drop of any state in the country. And more than 400,000 people
have newly enrolled in Medicaid," Bacon says. But Bevin promised to
eliminate the state's health exchange, Kynect, and he raised concerns
about the state's Medicaid expansion, though he later softened his
stance. More from Bacon: "[Bevin] now says he will follow the model of
Republican governors like Indiana's Mike Pence, who have accepted the
federal Medicaid funding but added changes like requiring some
recipients to pay premium fees. 'We're going to use what's called 1115
waivers. An 1115 waiver will be our request to CMS [the federal agency
that runs Medicaid] for basically the ability to take a block grant and
customize as Indiana and others have done to actually come up with a
program that will provide for these folks,' Bevin said in an interview
with NBC News on Monday."
Click here for the full article.
Source: NBC News
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