The first budget proposed by President Trump adds over $600 billion in cuts to Medicaid to the $880 billion included in the American Health Care Act. This would cut the program in half. The budget also cuts the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), insurance for kids who do not qualify for Medicaid but cannot afford health care, by 21 percent.

Medicaid provides health insurance for 74 million Americans who do not make enough money to buy private coverage. There is simply no way to cut Medicaid by over a trillion dollars without drastically changing who is eligible for the program and what services they can receive. And those people include our most vulnerable. Over half of the children born in the US come into the world with Medicaid coverage. Over 60 percent of the money spent on Medicaid supports the elderly and people with disabilities – kicking every single non-disabled adult and child off would still not even approach covering cuts of this magnitude.[1]

You can find out how many people in your county get Medicaid or our CHIP program (called Child Health Plus) here. And you can talk to your friends and family about how they get health insurance – almost everyone knows someone who has benefited from Medicaid.[2] More than half of Americans say Medicaid is important for their family – including 43 percent of Republicans and 57 percent of Independents.[3]

Politicians often say Medicaid is a “broken” program – but Medicaid is a program that makes life better for millions of people. Talking to your friends, family, and elected officials about how Medicaid helps you, your family, or your community is vital for changing the conversation and protecting the program. Maybe Medicaid let you get health care and still pay your other bills, or helped you survive a health emergency without hurting your family financially. Maybe Medicaid helped you have a healthy pregnancy, or is keeping your loved one safe in a nursing home. Let people know! You can also share your story with us.

[1] Mary Beth Musumeci and Katherine Young, State Variation in Medicaid Per Enrollee Spending for Seniors and People with Disabilities, Kaiser Family Foundation, May 1, 2017, http://kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/state-variation-in-medicaid-per-enrollee-spending-for-seniors-and-people-with-disabilities/.

[2] See Figure 8, Kaiser Health Tracking Poll: Future Directions for the ACA and Medicaid, February 24, 2017, http://kff.org/health-reform/poll-finding/kaiser-health-tracking-poll-future-directions-for-the-aca-and-medicaid/?utm_campaign=KFF-2017-March-Polling-Beyond-The-ACA&utm_content=54701829&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter

[3] See Figure 9 in the Kaiser Health Tracking Poll.