Stand under my (reorganized) umbrella
All eyes are on the federal government as it moves programs and reduces head count.
It’s Day 80 of the Trump administration, and the musical chairs process for reorganizing federal agencies continues. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is expected to brief the staff of House Energy and Commerce Committee members behind closed doors this Friday on changes to the agency to align with his “vision for reducing chronic disease.” He’s been mum on the reductions in workforce that took effect April 1, though lawmakers hope he’ll shed more light on the agency’s direction if accepts the invitation from Committee leadership to testify before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee.
Senate and House Republicans Set to “Kick the Can” on Medicaid Spending Cuts
Congressional Republicans are using the budget reconciliation process to enact the president’s top legislative priorities. The major advantage of the budget reconciliation process is that it can be used to pass legislation in the Senate on a 51-vote majority, rather than requiring the 60 votes that virtually everything else needs to surmount a filibuster. It is tempting to ignore the zigs and zags of the reconciliation process, but it will dictate the future of Medicaid. Manatt’s Nick Bath explains where things stand:
What’s happening in the budget reconciliation process this week?
To unlock the next step in the path to budget reconciliation, both chambers need to pass an identical budget resolution. The Senate passed a budget resolution early Saturday morning, which now goes to the House for consideration. Speaker Johnson sent a letter to his members over the weekend making the case for passing the Senate resolution, writing that passage of “the Senate’s amendment to the House resolution will allow us to finally begin the most important phase of this process: drafting the reconciliation bill that will deliver on President Trump’s agenda and our promises to the American people.” Up to this point, the two chambers disagreed strongly on the level of spending cuts that the budget resolution would require of the (subsequent) budget reconciliation bill; there has always been basic agreement on the spending (or more precisely, revenue loss) side of the ledger — extension of the Trump tax cuts for 10 years at a cost of roughly $4 trillion.
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ICYMI: President Trump Directs Federal Agencies to Eliminate Information Silos
Data sharing is the latest action item states should add to (or move up) their growing list of issues to watch in 2025. President Trump’s executive order, issued on March 20, aims to create “unfettered access to comprehensive data from all state programs that receive federal funding.”
Under federal law, however, CMS already has the ability to request data and perform audits to ensure compliance with federal requirements — with respect to state Medicaid agencies and state contractors — such as managed care plans, pharmacy benefit managers or prior authorization vendors as well as providers participating in Medicare and Medicaid. Similar data access and audit rights are also typical for HHS grant programs. It’s not clear whether this latest EO signals a change in agency policy or simply a shift in the frequency or granularity of the data CMS requests from states and other stakeholders receiving federal funding.
These standards generally don’t require funding recipients to disclose information concerning their activities outside the scope of the program.
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Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker attended a community meeting where advocates, providers, and patients shared their stories on the importance of protecting Medicaid. One in four Illinois residents are covered by Medicaid and are at risk of losing access to care or seeing their premiums increase under the proposed cuts.
Minnesota launched a series of statewide roundtables focused on the impact of proposed federal cuts to health care programs that serve 1.3 million Minnesotans, including Medicaid. Per state estimates, Minnesota could lose as much as $1.6 billion annually in federal funding if these cuts were allowed to move forward, leading many residents to lose their health care coverage or access to care.
Oregon’s state treasurer called on Congress to protect Medicaid from budget cuts. Medicaid covers approximately 1 in 3 people in Oregon, and, if these cuts were enacted, the state could stand to lose more than $3 billion in federal funding, putting more than 670,000 Oregonians at risk of losing their coverage. In her remarks alongside other state treasurers, Oregon’s state treasurer said that “Medicaid cuts will delay or deny health care, raise costs and push more families closer to financial instability and bankruptcy.”
Dr. Oz pushed for AI health care in first CMS town hall – Wired
Indiana House GOP overwhelmingly votes to impose Medicaid work requirements – Indiana Capital Chronicle
The skyrocketing cost of weight-loss drugs has state Medicaid programs looking for a solution – The Associated Press
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