One of the great themes of the Christmas season is surprise. Every child excited for Christmas morning understands it: the sense of wonder that comes along with an unexpected gift. From a Savior born in a manger to a present that reveals the care of a co-worker or friend, this season is all about surprises.
Politics is rarely characterized by wonder, and it would be wrong to put legislative bills or government actions on the same level as Christmas gifts, whether earthly or divine. Yet, I fear this legitimate caution might lead us to wrongly ignore just how surprising Governor Kelly’s latest proposal for Medicaid expansion really is. This Christmas season, it’s worth reflecting upon — and upon the responses to it from other legislative leaders too.
Everyone knows that Medicaid expansion, something that has been enacted by every state around Kansas and has the support of 70% of all Kansans, has always been Kelly’s largest legislative aim, and also the one which the Republican leadership has been most determined to deny her, regularly refusing to allow votes on the topic, even as a majority of Republicans state-wide agree with the need to expand the policy.
In this latest proposal, Kelly calls the Republican opposition’s bluff, by gifting them concessions on practically all their specific policy objections.
In regards to the objection that Medicaid must be denied to the working poor so as to protect funds earmarked for Kansas’s most vulnerable citizens, the proposal has a work requirement (something that puts our governor at odds with the Biden administration).
In regards to objections that Medicaid might be used to support reproductive services which many Kansans morally oppose, the proposal limits any medical support for abortion solely to cases of rape, incest, or where the life of the mother is directly threatened (something that puts our governor at odds with her own Democratic party, and possibly the Kansas Supreme Court as well).
Obviously no policy proposal will ever come through legislative debates and deal-making unscathed, so it’s possible to see these concessions as feints that the governor assumes won’t survive anyway. Republican leaders like Kansas House Speaker Dan Hawkins and Senate President Ty Masterson have both treated it that way, condescendingly praising the governor for validating their concerns but dismissing her proposal as “smoke and mirrors” nonetheless.
That is, I think, an ungenerous response. Why not instead recognize this proposal for what it is: a genuinely remarkable offering, putting some truly surprising options on the negotiating table?
After all, work requirements have a contentious history, with complicated enforcement rules, little track record of success, and deep opposition from welfare advocates. And in the wake of the strong defeat — heavily influenced by young women voters — of the abortion-rights-denying Value Them Both amendment last year, proposing rules that would limit the exercise of those rights seems like the last thing a Democratic politician like Kelly would do. And yet here both of them are, waiting to be torn into by Republican legislators, like wrapped presents beneath a tree.
I think this is the best way to view Governor Kelly’s Medicaid proposal: not as a gambit, but as a gift, a surprising attempt by an outgoing governor to make certain all the elite objections to this overwhelmingly popular policy are heard and met. Unexpected Christmas surprises are not always well-received, and unfortunately, this one likely won’t be either. But in the spirit of the season, we should appreciate it nonetheless.
Dr. Russell Arben Fox teaches politics at Friends University in Wichita.
