Senate Parliamentarian Eliminates Medicaid Reform Provisions, Leaving Costs/Problems Intact

The Senate’s parliamentarian has determined that many of the Medicaid provisions in the One Big Beautiful Bill cannot be passed with simple majority vote via the budget reconciliation process. CEI health care policy expert Jeremy Nighohossian says the problem remains how to deal with the program’s runaway costs and abuses:

“Congressional Republicans offered provisions that would have slowed the excessive growth of the Medicaid program. One of the provisions would have curtailed state abuse of funding gimmicks that pay health care providers rates well beyond what was intended under Medicaid. Effectively, Medicaid providers pay no taxes yet still draw substantial federal tax dollars. Congress still needs to address this exploitation of the system.”