WHAT THEY’RE SAYING: Van Orden’s Vote to Slash Medicaid and SNAP “Terrifying” for Wisconsin Families

Yesterday, Derrick Van Orden cast a deciding vote to slash Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP), despite repeatedly promising he’d oppose cutting these programs.

Van Orden broke his promise and voted to jeopardize health care and food assistance for tens of thousands of Wisconsinites, all so he could cut taxes for the ultra-wealthy at the expense of the poorest Wisconsinites – who won’t forget that Van Orden sold them out.

Read more about what Van Orden’s vote means for Wisconsin:

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Major changes could be coming to BadgerCare Plus, Medicaid in Wisconsin. Here’s what to know

• Republicans in Congress are pursuing major cuts to Medicaid that could cause tens of thousands of Wisconsin’s poorest residents to lose BadgerCare Plus coverage.
• For months, Democrats have been warning of Republican plans to slash Medicaid, saying it will throw millions of Americans off their health coverage.
• The largest Medicaid program in Wisconsin is BadgerCare Plus, which covers nearly 900,000 people, about half of them children. Most adults on BadgerCare Plus make less than the poverty level, or $15,650 for an individual.
• In Wisconsin, about one in five residents is enrolled in a Medicaid program.
• If the House bill ultimately becomes law, tens of thousands of Medicaid recipients in Wisconsin could lose coverage.
• Democrats on a joint Congressional committee estimated as many as 147,000 Wisconsinites could lose Medicaid coverage by 2034.
• Eric Borgerding, president of the Wisconsin Hospital Association, a trade group, said the GOP budget bill “will have severe and unfair consequences for Wisconsin health care,” arguing its changes to Medicaid would hurt Wisconsinites.

Wisconsin Examiner: Two parents put a face on the impact of potential Medicaid cuts

• Seawright was one of two parents who said Wednesday that their lives and their children’s lives could be profoundly upended by the Medicaid reductions that are included in the budget reconciliation proposal.
• The money saved, [Senator Baldwin] added, would be used to extend and expand tax cuts enacted in 2017, during the first Trump administration. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has said the tax cuts primarily favor the wealthy and corporations.
• “It’s giveaways for their wealthy friends at the cost of Americans’ health and lives,” Baldwin said. “That’s the deal.”
• When she and her sister were growing up, their mother was relying on Medicaid for the family’s health care. That helped give the family stability so that her mom could go to community college, become a medical assistant and get full-time work in health care with insurance through her employer, Seawright said.
• The family’s regular health insurance “could never cover the cost” those treatments required. Medicaid programs “have been absolutely instrumental in our lives.” The thought of losing Medicaid coverage “is terrifying,” Wampole said — both because of the loss of services for her son, but also because of its impact on other families.
• “I worry what our world looks like without Medicaid,” Wampole said.

Wisconsin Public Radio: Wisconsin would lose $314M in federal food assistance under ‘big, beautiful bill’

• Wisconsin would lose about $314 million in food assistance from the federal government under the massive budget bill passed by the U.S. House early Thursday, according to an analysis of the proposed cuts by the Wisconsin Department of Health Services.
• Speaking to reporters Thursday, Wisconsin Medicaid Director Bill Hanna said [the bill’s] changes amount to new red tape that could cause 90,000 Wisconsinites to lose some or all assistance.
• “There’s going to be more demand to put state money into a program that has been 100 percent federally funded for really its entire existence, which will strain the state’s ability to put its state dollars towards other things like education, our health care system and other important aspects of what we do with our state dollars,” Hanna said.
• Currently, about 700,000 Wisconsin residents — or an eighth of the state — receive SNAP.

Up North News: Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ is ugly for Wisconsin. Republicans voted for it anyway

• After vowing not to cut “a nickel” from benefits Wisconsin GOP House members vote for punishing cuts to food benefits and health care.
• All of Wisconsin’s Republican delegation voted yes Friday as the US House passed a budget bill that President Donald Trump calls big and beautiful—certainly true for billionaires, but most anyone else in Wisconsin struggling with a weakened US economy will see impacts that, while large, aren’t exactly pretty.
• In Wisconsin, the cuts to Medicaid coverage and to benefits in the Affordable Care Act could strip health insurance from 82,000 people, while another 235,000 would see their premiums rise, leading some of them to become uninsured. An estimated 144,000 Wisconsinites would be at risk of losing food benefits through SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program that covers 12% of the state’s population.
• Critics pointed out the cuts to food assistance and healthcare for struggling families won’t bring any fiscal benefit because the so-called savings are being plowed right into tax cuts skewed toward the wealthy.
• Wisconsin’s 3rd Congressional District, represented by Van Orden, is a microcosm for how the bill will hurt Americans everywhere.
• About 153,000 people in the 3rd District rely on Medicaid in order to have stable, affordable healthcare coverage, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation—including 21,000 seniors, an estimated 50,000 children, and 20,000 people with disabilities.
• An estimated 16,000 people could lose some or all of their SNAP benefits in that single district. And SNAP cuts would also hurt the businesses that accept SNAP payments and the farmers who provide food for struggling families. There are an estimated 12,000 people in the 3rd District working in agricultural, forestry, fishing, hunting and mining fields, based on a category used by the US Census Bureau.
• “He gave me his commitment that he would not make cuts to these critical programs,” Winn told Opportunity Wisconsin. “With his vote today, he has once again broken that promise. As a Medicaid beneficiary who also relies on SNAP, I’m deeply concerned about how these cuts are going to affect my ability to access the care and services I need. Giving tax breaks to billionaires with money taken from programs that make healthcare and food accessible is wrong and it’s not what we deserve from our Congressman.”

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