Arkansas governor seeks work requirement for Medicaid recipients
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Screenshot: Courtesy Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders administration
Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Tuesday that Arkansas will seek federal approval to require Medicaid recipients to work or volunteer to keep their benefits.
Why it matters: About 220,000 Arkansans receive Medicaid benefits, at an annual cost of $2.2 billion, she said.
What she's saying: "The requirement is simple: If you want to receive free health care paid for by your fellow taxpayer — able-bodied, working-age adults have to work, go to school, volunteer or be home to take care of their kids," Sanders said.
- About 90,000 of the state's recipients do not meet those requirements, she said.
Flashback: Arkansas was the first state to mandate that Medicaid recipients work for their benefits during the first Trump administration, but that was blocked by a court in 2019.
- About 62,000 people were subject to the work requirement in August 2018, and by that December, 18,000 had been dropped.
- The previous system was critiqued for being overly complicated.
State of play: The proposed "Pathway to Prosperity" amendment would use data-matching to identify people who weren't meeting the requirements.
- Rather than dropping them permanently, the state would use personal development plans and success coaching to work with them to keep in compliance, Janet Mann, state Medicaid director, said.
- "I'm confident the revised waiver will be approved by [the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services] and upheld in court and that we can get to implementing it quickly," Sanders said.
- Sanders' confidence is buoyed by the Trump administration, the data-matching component, and the fact that enrollees wouldn't be dropped without having an opportunity to meet the requirements.
- Much of Sanders' announcement was echoed in a letter to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary-designate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
What's next: There's a 30-day comment period before the waiver will be submitted to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.