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A bill to cut 111,000 Oklahomans from Medicaid advanced from the House of Representatives’ full Appropriations and Budget Committee late Tuesday despite agreement all around that the measure would violate federal law.

Also advancing was a bill requiring public high schools to incorporate an anti-abortion message teaching the “humanity of the unborn.”

House Bill 2665 by Rep. Doug Cox, R-Grove, would instruct the Oklahoma Health Care Authority to seek a federal waiver allowing the state to exclude from Medicaid all able-bodied adults under 65 with dependents.

According to statements during the committee meeting and a Feb. 8 subcommittee meeting, those affected would be adults with at least one dependent child and annual household income under $9,500. Many and perhaps most would be single parents with pre-school children.

Cox acknowledged the federal waiver is unlikely to be granted, but said the bill would “send a message to the federal government about the situation here in Oklahoma.”