For Medicaid cuts, national work requirements being considered, says Idaho’s U.S. Rep. Fulcher

U.S. Rep. Russ Fulcher, R-Idaho, sits on the House committee tasked with finding $880 billion in spending cuts over the next decade.

While he stressed that the House Committee on Energy and Commerce is early into searching for cuts, he offered a preview for what’s on the table in an interview with the Idaho Capital Sun on Monday.

“The big takeaway is, number one, our objective is to save it,” Fulcher said of Medicaid. “… And I think we’re going to get there. Number two: our objective is to keep the benefits intact for everybody it was intended for. And I think we’re going to get there.”

Asked what he meant by Medicaid’s intended population, Fulcher described what Medicaid enrollment looked like before the Affordable Care Act prompted all but 10 states to expand Medicaid.

“Disabled people, elderly people who truly need the health care, and they don’t have any other channel to get it. And that’s what Medicaid was designed for. And we’re trying to make sure that that remains intact,” he said.

But Fulcher pushed back on what he called misinformation about congressional Medicaid spending cut plans, naming U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, an Independent from Vermont, and U.S.  Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, who recently visited Idaho for a rally.

“I know exactly where they’re coming from, and they would like to see a universal health care system. And there was a big push to make Medicaid that vehicle — and it was just never designed for that,” Fulcher said.

“If you’re working-age, able-bodied, I think that there’s a reasonable chance that that’s going to change. But at the same time, I would say there’s some fairness in there too, because that was really never what was envisioned with the program. It’s just the expansion population included everybody, and there was never any discussion for a funding mechanism,” Fulcher said. “So shame on all of us for letting that happen.”

But not all of the House’s planned cuts need to come from Medicaid, he said. One of the first places the committee will look is to end mandates for electric vehicles and green energy, which he said could combine to well over $100 billion alone.

This story was originally posted by Idaho Capital Sun. Read the full article here.