The following statement was submitted by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).
Ever since Donald Trump was sworn into office, he has been on a
mission to kill the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that has provided health
insurance for millions of Americans, especially poor people and their
families. It’s part of his cruel agenda to shift public resources away
from people in need to pay for tax cuts that further enrich billionaires
like himself.
Trump’s latest scheme would have allowed Kentucky to impose work
requirements on Medicaid recipients. According to the state’s own
estimates, this would have resulted in nearly 100,000 low-income
Kentuckians losing the health insurance they receive through Medicaid.
We sued the Trump administration to stop this, along with our good
friends at the National Health Law Program, Kentucky Equal Justice
Center, and the law firm Jenner & Block. On Friday, a federal judge ruled in our favor, blocking the change that would have gone into effect as soon as this week.
This is a major victory. Not only will all of these Kentuckians
continue to be able to access health care services through Medicaid,
many other states are considering similar work requirements. Had this
policy gone into effect, it likely would have fueled a movement to cut
health insurance for poor people across America.
Within hours of being sworn in last year, President Trump signed an
executive order aimed at dismantling ACA – also known as Obamacare – his
predecessor’s landmark health reform law.
Obamacare expanded Medicaid to cover millions more people. Although
Congress failed to repeal and replace Obamacare, Trump has taken steps
to weaken it by going around the legislative process. Allowing states to
impose work requirements on Medicaid recipients was one of those steps.
In its own words, the Trump administration has said this would have
“fundamentally transformed” Medicaid. The purpose of Medicaid is to
provide medical insurance to people who cannot afford it, not to create
roadblocks to coverage.
The Trump administration claims that work requirements will lead to
better health outcomes because employment can be linked to improved
health, which they say will help move people off Medicaid as they make
more money.
This line of argument ignores the fact that nearly two-thirds of Medicaid recipients
are children, blind or otherwise disabled, or elderly. More than half
of the remainder are, in fact, already working. If they are not working,
they are likely elderly, disabled, retired, sick, or caring for a loved
one. Simply put, almost all Medicaid recipients who can work are
working.
The Trump administration knew its argument was disingenuous, and
recognized that many worthy Medicaid recipients would lose their health
insurance. So it sought to protect its voters from the changes, while
intentionally cutting Medicaid benefits for low-income people of color.
Kentucky’s waiver — as well as pending waivers for other states — would have exempted counties with high unemployment rates,
which tend to be majority-white, GOP-leaning, and rural. By contrast,
many low-income people of color who live in urban centers would not
qualify for the exemption. That’s because these cities are surrounded by
wealthier suburbs, which pull the county unemployment rates below the
qualifying limit.
What’s more, the Trump administration’s rhetoric on Medicaid and
waivers are fraught with decades-old racial myths suggesting that
low-income people of color are somehow living lavish lifestyles on
government assistance, while refusing to work. These ugly, old
stereotypes are contradicted by the actual lived experiences of Medicaid
recipients: Again, most enrollees who can work, do.
For now, Trump is defeated. Those 100,000 Kentuckians can continue
using Medicaid to see their doctors and access medical services.
But we know Trump is not going to give up — he will very likely
appeal this ruling. And he will likely approve similar plans in other
states, refusing to recognize the inhumanity of what he is doing. He has
a grotesque fixation with eliminating all of President Obama’s
accomplishments, and doesn’t seem to care that undoing ACA would cause
millions of Americans to lose their health insurance. This is a
life-and-death matter. People die when they cannot access medical care.
That’s why we will continue to fight for them. Thank you for caring
and supporting our work. Countless people are counting on us to stop
Trump from shredding the safety net.
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