Proposed cuts to Medicaid, health care services will produce actual harm to Idahoans

U.S. Mike Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, should be lauded for his vocal and enthusiastic support of increasing and renewing the Child Tax Credit.  It is one of those pandemic-era programs that made a big difference in a working, Idaho family’s ability to survive and thrive during tough times.

In many ways, the times have not improved. It is not easy or inexpensive to have and raise kids in 2025, and Sen. Crapo’s support for the Child Tax Credit reflects a sensitivity to that challenge.

Amid protests and Democratic pushback, U.S. House GOP launches work on Medicaid cuts

I would like to see him extend the same support to the 89,000 Idaho families that do not have enough income to qualify for the tax credit under the proposed guidelines. Those families face the same costs and the same challenges, but they have fewer resources to deal with it.

But on the issue of the proposed cuts to Medicaid, Sen. Crapo’s statements are much more cautious.

I first met Sen. Crapo in 1989 when I was working with a group of people attempting to move the state of Idaho to adopt Personal Care Services as an option of the state’s Medicaid program. We met in his office during the time he served as the Idaho Senate’s president pro tempore.

He agreed to let our bill get a hearing, a controversial stance due to the opposition of some in the Idaho Legislature. He struck me as fair minded and willing to do the right thing, even if that thing was controversial.

By 1990, a Personal Care Services bill was signed by Gov. Cecil Andrus and the program has subsequently allowed elders to stay in their own home, with assistance, rather than being placed in a nursing home. And it has given people with disabilities, who otherwise would be institutionalized, the option to live in community. 

Fast forward to 2025 and the national clamor to cut Medicaid due to waste, fraud, and abuse. Sen. Crapo has stated that he is not in favor of cutting benefits or coverage under Medicaid, but it is possible to cut the budget without technically changing the rules about coverage and benefits. It hardly matters if one qualifies for benefits and coverage if the dollars are not there to make it a reality.

Cutting the budget will result in fewer people being served, services being cut out, and new recipients on waiting lists for years. Idaho has avoided wait lists, and most people with disabilities cannot wait for years to access services. 

What always gets lost in this loud and vocal conversation that implies that users of Medicaid are engaging in waste, fraud and abuse is the unavoidable fact that big cuts to the Medicaid budget nationally will fall heavily on people with disabilities. The result will be life threatening harm to the same people we were working to protect in 1990 – elders and people with disabilities.

I personally know many adults with disabilities and families caring for their disabled family member. The suggestion that the families and individuals I know are engaging in waste or abuse is beyond outrageous. They carry huge burdens even with Medicaid assisting them. 

The pandemic took a nationwide toll on the services for people with disabilities. The headline of an article last week from Disability Scoop, a national newspaper on disability-related issues stated, “Nation’s Disability Services System Begins To Buckle As Funding Threats Intensify.”

And this characterization of services for people with disabilities was about other cuts being pushed through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services — before the proposed cuts to Medicaid have landed. Large cuts to Medicaid on top of the cuts in services already being rolled out will produce actual harm, real hardship and catastrophic overload for Idaho families caring for family members with disabilities. Surely that is not a good strategy to address waste, fraud, and abuse. It is more like an inquisition than problem solving.

Sen. Crapo needs to exhibit the same fair mindedness we witnessed in 1989 as we discussed personal care services, the same sensitivity that he is exhibiting for the plight of Idaho families raising children in 2025 – AND he should stand up for Medicaid with the same vocal enthusiasm he has brought to the Child Tax Credit. It is the right thing to do, even if it is a controversial stand within his own party.