Tag: welfare

Gavin Newsom Supports Medicaid Changes — Why Don’t Republicans?

To cut federal spending, Republicans should join Newsom in reforming Medicaid.

It says something about congressional Republicans’ unwillingness to reduce Medicaid spending when many of them stand well to the left of Gavin Newsom — I repeat, Gavin Newsom — on the subject. The California governor, a Democrat, recently put forward proposals that would reduce program spending and enrollment.

Newsom won’t win awards for courage when it comes to reforming Medicaid; an ongoing budget crisis, as opposed to policy principle, prompted his volte-face. But the problems in California speak to the larger dynamic Washington will face if it doesn’t get serious about curbing Medicaid’s problems.

Restrictions on Undocumented Immigrants’ Coverage

In his revised budget, Newsom proposed freezing enrollment for undocumented immigrants. Children would be permitted to join the state’s Medicaid program, but no more adults could enroll. Those adults who remain enrolled would face a $100 monthly premium, beginning in 2027.

The Medicaid expansion to those in the country illegally has remained a source of controversy. For starters, that program came in billions of dollars over budget earlier this spring, forcing Newsom’s office to seek emergency bailouts for the Medicaid program. That bailout came after Newsom used a legally questionable accounting scam to have Washington help fund this program — even though federal tax dollars generally do not cover Medicaid coverage for the undocumented. The reconciliation bill before Congress would prevent future use of this accounting loophole by states, saving an estimated $34.6 billion over ten years.

Given that Newsom helped expand California’s Medicaid coverage to the undocumented to begin with, let’s not kid ourselves that he acted out of deep-seated principle in proposing an enrollment freeze and premium charges. Instead, his state faces yet another cash crunch, and the governor was forced to react. Which could well describe what will happen in Washington once foreign governments get tired of financing our ever-increasing debt.

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Democrats Hate that New Bill Requires People to Work for Benefits

President Trump’s new budget proposal, the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” is already drawing fire from Democrats, who claim it robs the poor to enrich the wealthy. In reality, the bill delivers substantial tax relief for working families, without handing out money to the rich. It also introduces a simple requirement: some individuals receiving government benefits will need to work in order to qualify.

Critics claim that over 13 million people will lose Medicaid coverage under the new bill. But that figure is cumulative over ten years, not immediate. The bill doesn’t “take healthcare away from the poor”; it raises the bar for eligibility. Able-bodied adults under 65 will be required to complete a minimum number of hours each month in employment, job training, education, or, in some cases, community service to qualify for certain benefits. This requirement does not apply to the vulnerable, children, the elderly, pregnant women, the disabled, or full-time caregivers of young children are all exempt.

Importantly, those affected aren’t being denied care; they’re losing access to free, government-funded coverage under Medicaid due to updated qualifications. Many are expected to return to work and obtain insurance through employers or private plans. Others may requalify and reapply as their circumstances change.

Trump’s big sin here is requiring a portion of recipients to work for the benefits they receive. And Democrats hate any system where people are expected to earn their handouts.

Supporters of work requirements argue that they promote personal responsibility, encourage economic independence, and help control long-term government spending. They also reflect a widely held belief that public aid should be tied to effort, not handed out unconditionally.

Critics counter that such requirements create administrative hurdles that could cause eligible individuals to lose benefits. However, this is a non-issue. If someone qualifies, they will receive aid; if they don’t, they won’t. It’s that simple. If a bureaucratic glitch prevents them from getting their benefits, they can go down to the office, fill out the necessary forms, and request the aid be reinstated.

That shouldn’t be too difficult, after all, they’re not tied up at an office job all day.

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New York Governor Kathy Hochul Complains Republican Spending Bill Could Cut Services to ‘Members of the Undocumented Community’

New York’s Democrat Governor Kathy Hochul recently gave an interview to Telemundo in which she complained about the new Republican spending bill, claiming that it could adversely effect ‘members of the undocumented community.’ That’s Democrat speak for illegal aliens.

In voicing this concern, Hochul is ignoring the fact that millions of Americans voted for this. People watched for years under Biden as New York put illegal aliens up in luxury hotels and fed them three meals a day, spending untold billions of dollars on these people as American citizens suffered under the inflation of the Biden economy.

Perhaps New York wouldn’t find itself in this position if the state hadn’t spent a fortune month after month, catering to people who were in the country illegally.

Breitbart News has details:

Hochul: We’ll Lose Money Under GOP Bill, ‘Don’t Want to Go’ to Cutting Services for Migrants

During an interview with Telemundo 47 on Friday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) argued that the state is going to lose money under the Republican tax and spending bill and people will lose health care and responded to if she’ll have to cut services to some immigrants by saying, “I don’t want to go there.” And “This is something we have to look at very seriously for how we can not leave these people without essential care.”…

Host Alejandro Mendoza then asked, “Could we see something like we have seen in California where the governor had to cut services to some immigrants?”

Hochul responded, “I don’t want to go there. This is money that’s now been lost by the federal government — they used to help us pay for this. This is something we have to look at very seriously for how we can not leave these people without essential care.

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Privacy and hunger groups sue over USDA attempt to collect personal data of SNAP recipients

Privacy and hunger relief groups and a handful of people receiving food assistance benefits are suing the federal government over the Trump administration’s attempts to collect the personal information of millions of U.S. residents who use the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program

Privacy and hunger groups sue over USDA attempt to collect personal data of SNAP recipientsBy REBECCA BOONEAssociated PressThe Associated Press

Privacy and hunger relief groups and a handful of people receiving food assistance benefits are suing the federal government over the Trump administration’s attempts to collect the personal information of millions of U.S. residents who use the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

The lawsuit filed in Washington, D.C., on Thursday says the U.S. Department of Agriculture violated federal privacy laws when it ordered states and vendors to turn over five years of data about food assistance program applicants and enrollees, including their names, birth dates, personal addresses and social security numbers.

The lawsuit “seeks to ensure that the government is not exploiting our most vulnerable citizens by disregarding longstanding privacy protections,” National Student Legal Defense Network attorney Daniel Zibel wrote in the complaint. The Electronic Privacy Information Center and Mazon Inc.: A Jewish Response to Hunger joined the four food assistance recipients in bringing the lawsuit.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, is a social safety net that serves more than 42 million people nationwide. Under the program formerly known as food stamps, the federal government pays for 100% of the food benefits but the states help cover the administrative costs. States also are responsible for determining whether people are eligible for the benefits, and for issuing the benefits to enrollees.

As a result, states have lots of highly personal financial, medical, housing, tax and other information about SNAP applicants and their dependents, according to the lawsuit.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order March 20 directing agencies to ensure “unfettered access to comprehensive data from all state programs” as part of the administration’s effort to stop “ waste, fraud and abuse by eliminating information silos.”

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Liberals Suddenly Value Fiscal Responsibility After Budget Office Says More Births Will Increase Deficit

Liberals have a new argument for keeping federal money flowing to Planned Parenthood: defunding the organization would cost taxpayers more.

Democrats and abortion advocates are framing the defunding of one of the largest abortion providers in the country as a financial “cost” to taxpaying Americans. Citing estimates from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), they are voicing concern that the GOP’s plan to block Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood through the GOP reconciliation bill would increase the national deficit by $300 million due to more babies being born.

“About three in four people say they oppose defunding Planned Parenthood health centers. But Republicans do not care — they need to appease their far-right, anti-choice fringe,” Democratic Washington Sen. Patty Murray said on May 14 about the CBO’s estimates. “Although the irony is, in this case, defunding Planned Parenthood would actually cost our country more money in the long term.”

Murray’s office did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

Planned Parenthood performed over 400,000 abortions in fiscal year 2023-24 and received more than $700 million in government reimbursements and grants, according to its latest annual report. In contrast, private contributions dropped 31% relative to the previous fiscal year, totaling $684.1 million.

The CBO declined to clarify how the deficit would increase due to the federal cuts in response to a DCNF inquiry.

However, the CBO stated in 2015 that a House bill to block federal funding to Planned Parenthood would increase spending by $130 million over the course of a decade. The reason, CBO explained, was that the bill would reduce “services that help women avert pregnancies” and that “additional births that would result from enacting such a bill would add to federal spending for Medicaid.”

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Colombian woman charged with illegally voting in 2024 election stealing $400,000 in taxpayer funded benefits

A Colombian woman living illegally in the United States lived under a stolen identity for more than two decades, improperly received more than $400,000 in stolen federal benefits, and illegally voted in the 2024 presidential election, federal prosecutors said Thursday. 

Lina Maria Orovio-Hernandez, 59, also obtained welfare benefits, a REAL ID and eight other state ID’s, the Justice Department said. 

Orovio-Hernandez allegedly used the stolen identity to submit a fraudulent voter registration in January 2023, and cast a ballot in last year’s presidential election, prosecutors said. She was captured on surveillance camera at a bank wearing an “I voted” sticker on Nov. 5, 2024, Election Day, according to court documents. 

She is charged with false representation of a Social Security number; making a false statement in an application for a United States passport; aggravated identity theft; receiving stolen government money or property; fraudulent voter registration; and fraudulent voting. Orovio-Hernandez has been held in federal custody since February, when she was charged with identity theft and other offenses. 

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Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ Defunds Medicaid-Covered Transgender Surgery

President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax and spending budget, lovingly dubbed the “one big, beautiful, bill,” strips Medicaid’s funding for transgender surgeries — a move that will impact a large portion of such procedures if it passes the Senate.

The reconciliation budget, which narrowly passed the House of Representatives early Thursday morning in a 215-214-1 vote, would have initially prohibited Medicaid from covering “gender transition procedures” for children, until a late Wednesday amendment struck the words “minors” and “under 18 years of age” from that section, the Independent reported.

Gender transition treatments that would no longer be covered include puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and surgeries. 

A 2023 study by gynecologists from Columbia University and the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, revealed that a staggering 25 percent of so-called “gender-affirming” surgeries in the United States are covered by Medicaid. 

Out of the 48,019 patients identified in the report who underwent such surgeries, over 12,000 were Medicaid recipients. 

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Fury as Welsh Labour government spends £250,000 on project to count MOTHS while it cuts public services

Taxpayers have been left furious after the Welsh Labour government spent £250,000 on a project to count moths – while it cuts public services. 

The ‘Cryptic Creatures of the Creuddyn’ project is surveying the moths’ limestone habitats on Llandudno’s Great Orme headland and in neighbouring areas. 

It was handed a grant of £248,348 by the Government’s Nature Networks Fund, and will be delivered by the Heritage Fund.

The under-fire government claims it with help protect at-risk insects, including the Horehound Plume micro-moth. 

A Tory councillor branded the spending ‘ridiculous’ – as families struggle with the cost of living and local authorities cut frontline services.

Llandudno’s Louise Emery hit out after a grant was awarded by the Welsh Government to Conwy county council.

She said: ‘Rather than for the benefit of invertebrates, how about Welsh Government benefit schools and communities by properly funding local authorities to improve education and provide basic services such as maintaining highways and public toilets?

‘It’s about priorities, and establishing the number of moths on specific limestone headlands should not be a priority when Welsh Labour in Cardiff continue to tell local authorities they have no money. This is utterly ridiculous.’

The project, which also works with schools, found ‘a staggering’ 1,109 horehound plume moth caterpillars on the Great Orme in Llandudno.

Cllr Emery continued: ‘There is money available from Welsh Government but only for certain things, so while local authority budgets are really being squeezed, Welsh Government finds money for projects such as the Cryptic Creatures of the Creuddyn.

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Cop who claimed total disability was seen ‘dancing and drinking’ at Stagecoach, ran 5Ks, and went to Disneyland: DA

A former police officer from California claimed she couldn’t perform her duties after sustaining a head injury on the job — and then she was seen dancing at a music festival.

According to a press release from the Orange County District Attorney’s Office, 39-year-old Nicole Brown was a police officer with the Westminster Police Department when she was injured on the job in March 2022. The release stated that Brown sustained “a minor abrasion to her forehead while attempting to arrest and handcuff an uncooperative suspect.” She was examined at the emergency room after she complained about headaches, but was released without any medical restrictions.

Brown then allegedly called out sick for several days and claimed she’d been diagnosed with severe concussion syndrome, which resulted in her being placed on total temporary disability.

While unable to perform her duties as an officer, Brown was entitled to workers’ compensation benefits after sustaining her alleged injury while on the job — including her full salary, tax-free, paid for by “the city, county, or state agency that employs the officer,” according to the DA. After a one-year period, that amount decreases to 2/3 of her full salary but can pay out for up to 104 weeks.

According to the DA, Brown collected more than $600,000 in benefits.

However, evidence obtained by the DA’s office called Brown’s so-called “total disability” into question. While out on disability, Brown allegedly claimed that she suffered from “headaches, dizziness, sensitivity to light and noise, problems processing thoughts and words, and an inability to work on the computer or do any screentime.”

But on April 23, 2023 — a full year after Brown went on disability and while still claiming to be suffering symptoms of a concussion — Brown was seen by “several people” who had knowledge of her medical status “dancing and drinking at the Stagecoach Music Festival, with more than 75,000 people in attendance with loud music and bright lights everywhere and temperatures in excess of 100 degrees.”

After those people reported Brown’s activities at Stagecoach to the Westminster Police Department, an investigation into the officer’s disability claims began.

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22 More People, Entities Charged in Arizona Medicaid Fraud Scheme

An Arizona grand jury has indicted 22 individuals and entities linked to a massive Medicaid fraud scheme involving sober living homes.

The charges include money laundering, theft, conspiracy, fraudulent schemes, patient referral fraud, and forgery, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes announced Tuesday.

These indictments are part of an ongoing investigation into a $2.7 billion fraud that exploited Arizona’s health care system, particularly targeting Native Americans seeking treatment for drug and alcohol addiction.

According to the charge document, the 20 individuals indicted are associated with a church and a mental health organization called Happy House Behavioral Health. Prosecutors allege that Happy House was paid over $60 million for services that were either never rendered or only partially completed. Some of the billing, they say, was for clients who were deceased or incarcerated.

Prosecutors also allege that sober living facilities referred clients to Happy House, which in turn received funds from the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS), the state’s Medicaid agency. Happy House then allegedly paid the referring sober homes for those client placements, an arrangement at the center of the fraudulent scheme charges.

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