Arkansas governor’s ad on Medicaid work requirements draws flak from NAACP, right-wing commentators

A campaign ad from Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders portraying a Medicaid recipient playing video games and eating junk food instead of working has prompted backlash from the right and left, but for very different reasons.

The Republican governor unveiled an ad this week touting the state’s Medicaid work requirements, which will take effect in January. The 30-second spot features a white actor portrayed as “Brad,” a fictional Medicaid recipient.

“You actually work hard,” Sanders says in the spot, airing statewide as part of a six-figure ad buy. “You pay taxes to cover welfare for guys like Brad who just choose not to work.”

The NAACP Arkansas State Conference said it was “deeply concerned” about the ad, saying it unfairly stereotypes the poor as choosing not to work.

“Arkansas families deserve policies that address poverty — not advertisements that oversimplify it,” the group said in a statement. 

But Sanders’ faced even stronger pushback from conservative influencers and commentators who accused the governor of stereotyping white people.

“This Antiwhite ad should be taken down, the comms team fired, and the Governor’s Office issue an apology,” conservative activist Jack Posobiec wrote on X. 

Matt Walsh, another conservative activist, also criticized the spot.

“These idiotic cowards don’t even have the guts to criticize groups that will never vote for them anyway,” he posted on X.

Nearly 57% of people on Medicaid in Arkansas are white, according to 2024 figures compiled by KFF, a health research organization. About 20% of the state’s Medicaid population is Black according to the figures.

Sanders, who was White House press secretary for part of President Donald Trump’s first term, is running for reelection against Democratic state Sen. Fred Love and Libertarian Colt Shelby. She was first elected in 2022.

Arkansas has begun a ‘soft launch’ of Medicaid work requirements. What does that mean?

Arkansas’ work requirements for its Medicaid expansion program will take effect in January under the federal One Big Beautiful Bill Act that Trump signed into law last year.

The requirements mandate that recipients of the federal insurance program must complete 80 hours of work, community service, higher education, work programming or a combination of the four each month, unless they meet certain exemption criteria. 

The last time Arkansas implemented work requirements for Medicaid, more than 18,000 people lost coverage before a federal judge blocked the restriction. Experts who studied the requirements found a significant increase in uninsured adults, and no signs the requirement created workforce gains.

Sanders has brushed off criticism of her work requirement ad.

“Some critics online don’t like my welfare work requirement ad. Next thing you know they’ll say I should have used cookies instead of cheese balls,” she posted on X.