U.S. News: States Fight Medicaid Expansion
WASHINGTON -- Some governors are pushing to scale back or kill proposals to expand Medicaid to provide health-care coverage to the uninsured, raising a new challenge to President Barack Obama's effort to overhaul the system.</br></br>Medicaid, the health-care program for the poor, is funded through a combination of federal and state tax money. Proposals in the House and Senate would expand the program to cover at least a third of the nation's 46 million uninsured, but states are worried they would get stuck with a big part of the tab.</br></br>Several governors, including Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire of Washington and Republican Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi, plan to come to Washington this week to discuss health issues with White House and congressional officials. Medicaid is expected to be a primary topic.</br></br>"[W]e're wary of additional financial obligations when we're struggling to cover the obligations we have," said Jonathan Seib, a Gregoire health-policy adviser.</br></br>In private meetings, Senate Democrats working on health care have assured the governors that the federal government will assume all the costs for the expansion at first, followed by a transition to shared responsibility. House Democrats are pressing to have the federal government take on the full cost permanently.