A measure to expand Medicaid coverage in Kansas will be laid on Gov. Sam Brownback’s desk.
The bill, which drew bipartisan support in each house of the Legislature, passed its final test in the Senate on Tuesday, 25-14, after first-round approval in the chamber on Monday, 25-13.
Sen. Caryn Tyson, who represents Allen County, was absent on Monday, and then cast a “no” vote on Tuesday.
Advantage is up to 180,000 additional non-disabled Kansans — elderly and poor — will have medical coverage under provisions of the Affordable Care Act.
That the bill has advanced this far shows that the majority of legislators recognize that helping the poor, elderly and disabled is the morally correct thing to do.
Trump’s decision to pull the Republican health care bill as a replacement for the ACA — or Obamacare, if you prefer — gave Medicaid expansion in Kansas legs. Had Freedom Caucus Republicans in D.C. not turned a thumbs down on the GOP substitute, the ACA would have been largely defunded, and Medicaid expansion severely threatened.
That there are Kansans who live day-to-day in fear an illness or accident will plunge them into poverty, has gone on too long. They could have had coverage starting in 2010, but Brownback, with a legion of ultra-conservatives at his beck and call, made feeble excuses for not taking advantage of the ACA provision to expand Medicaid, almost entirely on the fed’s nickel. His bullheadedness became legendary.
A second and also extremely important handicap to not having expanded Medicaid is that Kansas hospitals have been adversely affected financially. They lost millions of dollars when bills went unpaid, many of which would have been if adequate Medicaid reimbursement was available.
Public hospitals legally are required to treat whoever walks in the door suffering ailment or injury. Often, those who would qualify for Medicaid are in no position financially to pay more than a meager portion of costs, if that.
When Mercy Hospital in Independence closed in October 2015, one of the reasons was its revenue stream was drying up, in large part due to lack of Medicaid compensation.
THE NEXT hurdle is what Brownback will do.
He has been firm in his opposition to making Medicaid coverage available to more Kansans, and, as he did with the effort to restore income tax cuts of 2012-13, Brownback has said he would veto this bill.
Kansas Medicaid currently covers 377,000 poor, disabled and elderly people, but excludes poor adults under 65 who aren’t disabled and don’t have children at home.
Brownback’s recent reaction, the Associated Press reported, was to write with other Republican governors to congressional leaders last week that expanding Medicaid under Obama’s policies would move the program away from its “core mission” of helping the truly vulnerable — as if someone 64 years old and just existing wasn’t vulnerable.
If he does veto the bill, the House is likely to muster the 84 votes — of 125 members — necessary to override, just as it did earlier with the income tax bill.
The Senate’s approval margin of 24-15 means three additional members of the chamber would have to join the 24 voting for Medicaid expansion for a veto override.
The better approach would be for Brownback to sign the bill, or at the very least let it sit unsigned for 10 days and then become law on its own accord.
— Bob Johnson
