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Missouri House blocks Medicaid funding expansion

By Madison Parry

Members on the Missouri House Budget Committee voted no to funding for the expansion on Medicaid. The decision follows an August vote where just over half of Missouri voters approved an expansion. Expanded eligibility goes into effect July 1, 2021 for an estimated additional 275,000 residents.

This week, Missouri lawmakers in the House of Representatives voted down funding for the expansion on Medicaid.

The measure to expand Medicaid was approved by 53 percent of voters back in August 2020. The vote will allow an additional 275,000 Missourians to become eligible this summer when it takes effect on July 1, 2021. Missouri became the 37th state to expand Medicaid.

Republicans on the House Budget Committee voted down the funding as Representatives debated the Missouri’s $34.6 billion budget.

“Government programs, expansion programs, they can’t just start by fiat,” Rep. Dirk Deaton, R-Noel, said in a report by the Associated Press. “Money can’t just leak out of the treasury to start expansion of government programs.”

“People say the federal government provides 90 percent of the amount for the program, in fact, the federal government does not have any money,” House Budget Committee Chairman Cody Smith (R-Carthage) said. “Those are only taxpayer dollars.”

Representatives of the Democratic Party continued the attempt to add funding for the expansion back in. Regardless, Medicaid expansion in Missouri will be implemented, whether or not state funding is provided.

Democrats tried to add the funding back in for the expansion multiple times during debate, each time it failed, but they reminded their colleagues across the aisle, the expansion will happen whether the state funds it or not.