Democrats call for action on Medicaid drop after key Republican concedes problems

JEFFERSON CITY — Missouri Democrats are calling for emergency action on Medicaid after a key Republican said thousands of children who recently lost state coverage were likely eligible for benefits.

House Minority Leader Crystal Quade, D-Springfield, said Monday she’s happy to see Republicans conceding real problems with the system, which has shed more than 150,000 people in the past two years in a drop ranking among the country’s largest.

But Quade said Republicans, who control the government, must do more. She said Gov. Mike Parson should “pause” any further removals from the rolls until issues with the state’s Medicaid system are sorted out.

Beyond the issues potentially affecting children, Democrats have also raised concerns about adults potentially losing benefits due to computer errors. They said many people who failed to properly renew coverage never received proper notification of their options.

Quade added that such a “pause” has plenty of precedent.

“(Former Missouri) Gov. Jay Nixon did this in 2014,” she said, “and Louisiana has ‘paused’ after experiencing similar declines to Missouri's numbers."

It’s not clear Parson will bite, precedent or not.

Quade said Parson's top Medicaid official, Todd Richardson, dismissed the idea when Democrats asked him about the 'pause' idea. A spokeswoman for Parson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the idea Monday afternoon.

(In a previous email to the News-Leader, a spokeswoman said the governor’s office is “working to ensure eligible Missourians have access to benefits” in multiple ways, including “working with stakeholders and advocates to ensure we are addressing access issues as appropriate for the government to intervene.”)

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But Quade said Democrats had to try.

“Even if the Republicans won’t move, we still need to fight for what is right,” she said.

Quade told reporters assembled at a news conference Monday she’s hopeful some things may get done, though.

She was quick to applaud House Speaker Elijah Haahr, R-Springfield, for moving along a plan to make it easier to apply for all the state’s benefit programs, for example.

Later in the day, a House committee voted to recommend the entire chamber pass the bill.

Quade said a bill from Rep. Sarah Unsicker, D-Shrewsbury, could also help things by guaranteeing children a full year of medical coverage once they’re deemed eligible for benefits.

Unsicker has said the bill would reduce “churn” that happens when kids fall off the rolls when their parents make a little more money in a given month and then re-apply when household income goes back to normal.

It’s not clear Unsicker’s bill, which was filed in December, will get a hearing. But Quade pointed out Rep. Steve Helms, R-Springfield, filed a similar bill earlier this month and Haahr referred it to committee last week.

In an interview Monday afternoon, Helms said he’d talked to Unsicker and is “happy to help reform the Medicaid system to make it work better and more efficiently for everyone.”

Quade said she’s also filing her own bill to tackle issues Rep. David Wood, R-Versailles, recently told the News-Leader led to children losing a certain type of coverage when their parents did.

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Wood said thousands of kids who lost coverage that way were likely eligible for a different program and would have been fine if their parents had sent in new applications for them.

Quade and other Democrats have said the state should fix the mistake.

"We have a chance during the coming weeks to do right by Missouri's children," she said, "and I hope the Republican leadership will make this a priority."

Austin Huguelet is the News-Leader's politics reporter. Got something he should know? Call him at 417-403-8096 or email him at ahuguelet@news-leader.com. You can also support local journalism at News-Leader.com/subscribe.