Michigan Republicans have pending legislation that would make our state’s Medicaid rules, as LOLGOP put it, “the most regressive requirements in the entire nation.” They would force hundreds of thousands of poor residents to either find a job that will allow them to work no fewer than 29 hours a week or they’d lose their benefits. It would also impose […]

There’s been some finger-wagging that liberals shouldn’t be cheering the Republicans’ huge defeat on Trumpcare. As everyone knows, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) didn’t actually put the bill up to a vote because it was doomed by defections from moderate Republicans and Freedom Caucus members alike. And President Trump didn’t know the bill well enough to whip votes, Politico Magazine […]

Michigan Congressman Dan Kildee reminds Governor Rick Snyder and others that without the Affordable Care Act, there would be no Medicaid expansion. At the moment, the future of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare, is anyone’s guess. Congressional Republicans and Donald Trump promised to repeal the law on the President’s first day in office … but that obviously didn’t […]

After losing her job and being diagnosed with advanced breast cancer, this woman could not have paid for treatment if it wasn’t for Obamacare. Laurie Merges never expected to be relying on Medicaid. As a highly educated woman with a successful career in corporate sales, she has worked her entire life and is raising three children, a 10-year-old and six-year-old […]

The way the Affordable Care Act helped her family transformed her attitude — and led to a touching interaction with former President Obama. Annette was not always a fan of President Barack Obama. In fact, in 2009 she went to a Tea Party rally protesting the Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare. She and her entire family were conservative Republican […]

Without insurance, Mark would have put off the care he needed to save his tooth. Sometimes, it’s the little things. Mark admits he’s not one of the people whose lives have been saved by the Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare. But having insurance did save his tooth. The 26-year-old, who lives in Portland, Oregon, is a bike commuter because […]

Without the Affordable Care Act, she would not have been able to get the surgery needed to treat her skin cancer. It’s frightening enough to be diagnosed with cancer, so imagine losing your health insurance just one month later. That’s what happened to Wendy back in 2011, when she was diagnosed with

The history of Medicaid expansion in Michigan as part of the Affordable Care Act is a long and troubled one. The Republican-led legislature hemmed and hawed and finally passed it in a way that wasted hundreds of millions of dollars and unnecessarily delayed working poor Michiganders from obtaining coverage. When they finally got around to passing it, they did it […]

Fantastic news for the 600,000 low-income Michiganders who rely on the program for their health insurance. When the Michigan Legislature submitted their plans for a customized version of Medicaid expansion to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) in 2013, there was no guarantee CMS would sign off on either of the waivers to require more “skin in the […]

Chris already did an excellent job highlighting the significant shortcomings of Sunday’s Detroit News editorial, which essentially asserts that the sky is falling and we’d all better run away from Michigan’s Medicaid expansion program, the Healthy Michigan Plan. If you haven’t read Chris’ piece, you should. But there’s a sobering omission I had to weigh in on, something that’s left […]

Study shows that access to physicians went up, not down — exactly the opposite of what ACA opponents predicted. Once again, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is proving its critics wrong. Opponents of the ACA, or Obamacare, have been falling all over themselves proclaiming that an influx of new patients will overburden the healthcare system, creating a dire doctor shortage. […]