Federal budget would cut Medicaid, harming Kentuckians. Our GOP Congressmen don’t care | Opinion

We are a long way from a final budget document approved by both houses of Congress.

But what we have seen in the first steps so far — the budget resolution passed by the U.S. House on Tuesday — has the potential to hurt hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians.

It calls for $4.5 trillion in tax cuts and a $2 trillion reduction in federal spending over a decade, rewarding the wealthy and punishing millions of people who depend on social safety nets.

That’s on top of the whiplash governance being inflicted on us by an unelected billionaire, who is taking a chainsaw to numerous programs that affect Kentucky, sometimes reversing those decisions, but leaving behind a state of uncertainty and fear for the 23,000 federal employees who live here.

This is no way to run a government.

And it’s a shame that most of Kentucky’s Congressional delegation is supporting both Elon Musk and the first budget proposal. They know full well this budget would cut programs for the poor in order to pay for tax cuts for the rich, despite Trump’s promises that social programs like Medicaid, health insurance for low-income people, would not be cut.

This is regressive policy, despite widespread evidence that trickle down economics don’t work and tax cuts for the rich only make them richer rather than juicing the economy.

This approach is also a betrayal many of the Kentuckians who delivered this state to Trump.

(It will also increase the federal deficit, which is why Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky was the lone Republican no vote.)

Consider the proposal to cut $880 billion from the agency that runs Medicaid. One in three Kentuckians gets their health insurance through Medicaid, which was expanded by former Gov. Steve Beshear, greatly reducing the number of Kentuckians without any health insurance at all.

These cuts would harm individuals and our state’s already precarious rural health care system with hospital closings, as current Gov. Andy Beshear has warned.

The budget proposal also calls for $230 billion in cuts from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) used by 587,000 Kentuckians, according to the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy. This helps people afford groceries while injecting much-needed dollars into Kentucky’s economy.

Medicaid helps so many people in so many ways — the elderly who need dementia care, severely handicapped children, people who can no longer work, the many underemployed people whose low-wage service jobs don’t offer health care. But who benefits the most from Medicaid and stands to lose the most if its programs are eliminated? Women and children.

In just one example, 40 percent of births in Kentucky are covered by Medicaid, including prenatal care, delivery and postpartum care.

“We already have poor outcomes in Kentucky, with high rates of maternal death, infant mortality, and low birth weights,” Melissa Eggen, an assistant Professor at the University of Louisville School of Public Health told the Herald-Leader.

“If women can’t get access to preventive care, we might see worse outcomes.”

Politicians must listen

Our Congressional delegation appears to be unimpressed.

On Monday, Fayette County Schools Superintendent Demetrus Liggins and school board chairman Tyler Murphy wrote a letter to Sixth District Congressman Andy Barr, R-Ky. imploring him to find a different solution.

The Medicaid cuts would hurt school-based health clinics, the SNAP cuts would affect 61 of Fayette’s 70 schools where students receive free breakfast and lunch, and other proposed education cuts would hurt teacher training and other programs.

“Should you want to discuss our budget or process, we welcome a conversation,” the two district leaders said.

“We know that when you see the work happening on the ground and hear from our families, you will see these federal dollars are indispensable. Continued cuts to education will cause lower achievement, higher employee dissatisfaction, and poor outcomes for our community.”

When Herald-Leader education reporter Valarie Honeycutt Spears requested a comment from Barr’s office, his spokesman Tyler Staker, said the claims in the letter were “factually incorrect” because “no final policy decisions have been made.”

He said that it was incorrect to talk about Medicaid cuts because the program was not specifically named in the budget proposal, only the agency that oversees Medicaid.

This is utterly disingenuous and hypocritical. Barr should be ashamed.

We are not the only ones who feel this way. On Wednesday, Herald-Leader photojournalist Tasha Poullard interviewed two Lexingtonians protesting outside Barr’s office.

Lexington residents Mike Donnelly and Alison Craig demanded that the Lexington Republican “keep Kentucky in mind” when voting in support of sweeping budget cuts to Medicaid.

“I’ve been calling Andy Barr two times a day for weeks, asking him to keep Kentucky in mind when he voted [for] the budget,” said Craig. She held a sign that read, “Andy Barr voted to defund Medicaid and give the rich a 4.5 trillion dollar tax cut. He hates Kentuckians.”

Donnelly’s sign read: “Grow a spine Barr, defend democracy, not your career.”

“This is the most critical time in our history that I have experienced,” Donnelly said.

But the rest of the delegation should listen, too. Rep. Hal Rogers, for example, represents nine of the 10 poorest counties in Kentucky, several of which are among the poorest in the nation.

Certainly, this budget proposal will help him and his cronies, but to think it will help the vast majority of his constituents shows a delusion that cannot just be blamed on old age.

We would urge our entire delegation to consider in-person town halls so they can explain exactly why they support putting the interests of the wealthy above the rest of us.

This story was originally published February 27, 2025 at 1:55 PM.