Kasich still pushing health-law alternative
A week after his Oval Office meeting with President Donald Trump, Ohio Gov. John Kasich continues to push for his own version of an Obamacare replacement.
Thursday, the Republican governor spoke by telephone with Vice President Mike Pence, who was in the Cincinnati area to discuss
health care with business leaders. Kasich repeated his concerns about maintaining coverage for low-income Ohioans added to Medicaid rolls with federal aid provided under the Affordable Care Act.
Kasich also has been trying to build support among his fellow GOP governors after a flurry of meetings last weekend in Washington that
included Ohio Office of Health Transformation Director Greg Moody and Medicaid Director Barb Sears. But like with majority Republicans in Congress, consensus among the governors is so far elusive.
And even if the governors do wind up backing a plan similar to Kasich’s, there is no guarantee Republicans in Washington will go along.
In his phone call with Pence, Kasich “reiterated his concerns about maintaining necessary
coverage for the poor, mentally ill and drug addicted,” a gubernatorial adviser said.
With Trump and congressional leaders still working on plans to repeal and replace Obamacare, Kasich has proposed a plan that would allow states to preserve health care coverage while giving them unprecedented flexibility over their Medicaid programs.
Under Kasich’s plan, states could scale back eligibility levels, mandate
managed care and limit coverage of some high-cost medications if a cheaper alternative exists.
And instead of replacing uncapped federal matching funds with set-amount block grants like some suggest, states would receive a percapita allotment tailored to their caseloads. For instance, additional federal aid would be provided for higher-cost patients, including the elderly and disabled.
It’s unclear whether the Ohio-ized plan or parts of it might be included in any Obamacare replacement proposals coming from Trump, House Republicans or GOP governors, but a Kasich adviser said there was “general praise” for it along with some follow-up questions earlier this week.
In his Tuesday night address to Congress, Trump appeared sympathetic to several concerns of Kasich and other governors about people losing coverage, saying “we should give our state governors the resources and flexibility they need with Medicaid to make sure no one is left out.”
Meanwhile, House Speaker Paul Ryan told Republican lawmakers Thursday that leaders plan to draft legislation
this weekend revamping the health care law, the latest indication that party leaders are trying to surge ahead despite persistent disputes over what the measure should contain. The Wisconsin Republican described the timetable at a closeddoor meeting of GOP lawmakers, according to Rep. Mike Coffman, R-Colo., the Associated Press reported.
While disputes remain over taxes and other issues, legislative leaders want the House to approve an alternative in the next few weeks in hopes of letting the Senate consider the bill before Congress takes an early April break.
Underscoring the sensitivity, one author of the emerging bill was resorting to unusually secretive steps to prevent details from circulating, AP reported. Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, was showing a draft of his panel’s portion of the bill to Republicans on that committee in its offices, according to one GOP lawmaker and a congressional aide. Legislators were not given copies of that draft, a week after an earlier version of the measure was leaked to reporters and lobbyists.
Following reports that a major chunk of their health-care legislation was being held for House GOP review in a secret room somewhere in the Capitol complex, Democrats and Republicans who hadn’t been invited hunted from room to room, Bloomberg News reported.
Ryan told reporters later that Republicans are “working very closely with the Trump administration” on the proposal.
What happens to the Medicaid expansion is unclear.
Thirty-one states and the District of Columbia expanded Medicaid under Obamacare, including 16 states led by GOP governors. The House Republican plan reportedly would provide money for those states and for the 19 states — mostly run by Republicans — that didn’t expand Medicaid. But whether it’s enough to maintain caseloads is not known.
In Ohio, expansion allowed 700,000 previously uninsured low-income adults to receive health coverage, pushing total Medicaid enrollment to more than 3 million.