{"id":661753,"date":"2026-10-30T14:24:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T14:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/661753\/"},"modified":"2026-10-30T14:24:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T14:24:09","slug":"why-health-care-and-medicaid-cuts-have-become-major-issues-for-republicans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/661753\/","title":{"rendered":"Why health care and Medicaid cuts have become major issues for Republicans"},"content":{"rendered":"

Less than a week out from the 2026 midterms, Republicans across the country are feeling the heat from their party\u2019s vote last year to shrink Medicaid by roughly $1 trillion<\/a> over the next decade. The cuts, driven largely by new work requirements and eligibility checks, are expected to leave more than 7 million Americans without insurance<\/a> by 2034. They\u2019ll also hit hospitals, clinics, and nursing homes that everyone uses, whether or not they\u2019re on Medicaid.<\/p>\n

These cuts weren\u2019t supposed to be noticeable to voters just yet. Republicans designed them to take effect in 2027, after the midterms.<\/p>\n

But some of the damage is already showing up. Paired with a reduction in tax credits<\/a> to help buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act, and rising employee premiums<\/a>, the cuts are colliding with a broader voter revolt against the high cost of living \u2014 and have turned healthcare into a top midterm issue.<\/p>\n

A slew of recent polling shows healthcare costs sitting at the top of voters\u2019 economic worries as the campaign season winds down. A KFF poll from earlier this month found healthcare outranked food, housing, and utilities<\/a> as a top concern, with nearly half of voters saying it was \u201cextremely important\u201d for candidates to be talking about. And in late September, an Associated Press and KFF survey of rural voters found<\/a> that twice as many said the Trump administration\u2019s healthcare policies had hurt the health of people in their community as said they\u2019d helped.<\/p>\n

Healthcare costs top the list of voters\u2019 economic concernsThe GOP\u2019s new $50 billion rural fund doesn\u2019t offset $137 billion in rural Medicaid cuts, and the savings come mostly from people losing coverage.Work requirements hit nationwide in 2027, so the first wave of coverage losses lands as the 2028 campaign begins.<\/p>\n

Republicans have tried to rebrand the One Big Beautiful Bill Act as the \u201cWorking Families Tax Cuts,\u201d but Politico found voters largely unmoved<\/a> by the new name, and Fox News recently gave Democrats<\/a> a 22-point lead on who voters trust to handle healthcare.<\/p>\n

Democrats, for their part, have put healthcare costs at the center of their closing argument. It\u2019s the issue they\u2019ve spent more on than any other, according to the Cook Political Report\u2019s Battleground Issue Tracker<\/a>, with more than $215 million across the most competitive House and Senate races this year. Democrats trying to flip red seats are running ads on reversing the Medicaid cuts<\/a> and on having relied on Medicaid once themselves<\/a>, while outside liberal groups are spending millions of dollars in ad<\/a>s tying Republicans to the cuts, and leading an 8,000-mile bus tour through 36 cities.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ll have even more to work with next year. The new Medicaid work requirements and the six-month eligibility checks that Republicans delayed past the midterms will all take effect in 2027, which means the first wave of people losing health insurance coverage will hit right as the 2028 campaign begins.<\/p>\n

Republicans\u2019 defenses aren\u2019t holding up<\/p>\n

Reducing Medicaid spending became a critical part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act in order to help offset the multitrillion-dollar cost of extending President Donald Trump\u2019s first-term tax cuts, adding some new ones, and funding ICE.<\/p>\n

Mindful of the potential for political backlash, Republicans took steps to ward off attacks.<\/p>\n

The main defense Republicans have relied on is to point to a $50 billion rural health fund that was also included in the bill. The GOP is touting it as \u201cthe single largest investment\u201d in rural healthcare in over 20 years.<\/p>\n

But fact-checkers and health analysts have been clear that this temporary infusion of funds, spread out over five years, doesn\u2019t offset the $137 billion in permanent cuts projected to hit rural areas<\/a> over the same decade.<\/p>\n

Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins, who voted to let the One Big Beautiful Bill Act reach the Senate floor but against final passage, leaned on this rural healthcare fund in a debate earlier this month. \u201cIf I had not allowed the bill to go to the floor, I would never have been able to author the $50 billion fund to help rural healthcare,\u201d she said<\/a>. Troy Jackson, her Democratic challenger, emphasized<\/a> that the fund comes nowhere close to covering what Mainers stand to lose. \u201cSenator Collins is like an arsonist who helped set the fire, and then she wants credit for bringing a cup of water to put it out,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Voters don\u2019t need a fact-check to notice when a hospital shuts down or reduces service. In some cases, medical institutions aren\u2019t waiting for the cuts to arrive, and are making decisions based on the federal funding they expect to lose. In Iowa, for example, MercyOne Clinton Medical Center ended labor and delivery services<\/a> earlier this year, citing decreased Medicaid funding as part of the reason.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe public\u2019s not stupid, and we\u2019re all already absorbing a lot of additional costs that we shouldn\u2019t have to because of Republican decision-making in Washington, DC,\u201d Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer told Politico recently<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The second is to deny there is reduced spending at all. \u201cIt\u2019s not an actual cut,\u201d as GOP Rep. David Valadao of California said in a debate several weeks ago \u2014 the savings, Republicans argue, come from cracking down on waste, fraud, and abuse<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This distinction is an important one in certain campaigns. Medicaid covers over 60 percent of Valadao\u2019s California district,<\/a> and he voted for the bill. Valadao also led a letter<\/a>, signed by 12 other Republicans from battleground districts, declaring that \u201cwe cannot and will not support a final reconciliation bill that includes any reduction in Medicaid coverage for vulnerable populations.\u201d Every one of them ultimately voted for it.<\/p>\n

Loss of coverage is already happening in Nebraska, the only state to start enforcing its new Medicaid work requirements ahead of the deadline.<\/p>\n

The \u201cno actual cuts\u201d claim rests on a technicality that the law doesn\u2019t reduce benefits for anyone who stays enrolled. But the roughly $1 trillion in savings the Congressional Budget Office scored comes almost entirely from people losing coverage. When Arkansas tried the same 80-hour-a-month work requirement in 2018, more than 18,000 people lost their health insurance<\/a> within months. This happened mostly because people didn\u2019t know about the changes or couldn\u2019t handle the new paperwork.<\/p>\n

Loss of coverage is already happening in Nebraska, the only state to start enforcing its new Medicaid work requirements ahead of the deadline. Millions more across the country are getting notices in the mail<\/a> that they could lose their insurance next year.<\/p>\n

The problems driving voter anger are about to get worse<\/p>\n

Nebraska offers the clearest preview of what\u2019s coming. The state began enforcing its Medicaid work requirements<\/a> in July, well ahead of the federal deadline, and more than 1,000 residents have already lost coverage, according to the Washington Sun. Republican Sen. Pete Ricketts, who voted for the bill, is tied with Dan Osborn<\/a>, an independent, in a state that Trump carried easily.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne out of two Republicans either are, have been or have a family member that is or has been on Medicaid,\u201d Bob Ward, a pollster with the GOP firm Fabrizio Ward, told the Washington Sun. \u201cIt\u2019s not like a theoretical thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rest of the country will experience these new administrative burdens beginning in January. Adults covered under the Medicaid expansion will have to prove every six months that they\u2019re working, volunteering, or attending classes at least 80 hours per month, or demonstrate that they qualify for an exception.<\/p>\n

There were Republicans, including some who ultimately voted for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, who warned in 2025 that voters would not respond well to billions of dollars in Medicaid cuts. Polling at the time found that 71 percent of voters who backed Trump also said they\u2019d oppose cutting the federal health insurance program<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Several months before voting for the bill Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley warned that cutting Medicaid<\/a> would be \u201cboth morally wrong and politically suicidal.\u201d Trump himself told<\/a> his fellow \u201ccost-cutting Republicans\u201d to avoid going \u201ctoo crazy\u201d and \u201cREMEMBER, you still have to get reelected.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leaders working in healthcare say these changes will drive up costs for all patients, irrespective of whether they use other forms of insurance. For example, if there are fewer people able to access primary care through Medicaid, then more patients will need to utilize hospital emergency rooms for care, and hospitals are required to provide treatment there regardless of whether they\u2019ll be reimbursed. To cover that lost Medicaid revenue, experts expect that some hospitals will need to cut staff, services, or close clinics. They\u2019ll also likely shift costs onto everyone else, through longer ER wait times and higher premiums for patients still on insurance.<\/p>\n

Workers who get insurance through their employers are bracing for hikes, too. KFF\u2019s annual employer survey<\/a> found the average worker is paying more than $600 more toward a family plan this year than in 2025, and the cost-shifting that follows Medicaid cuts is expected to push premiums higher still. One August survey of employers found average plans<\/a> are projected to rise next year by more than 8 percent. Roughly 160 million Americans get coverage this way.<\/p>\n

Republicans have made a bet that higher costs won\u2019t hurt them next week or in two years. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), who announced his retirement days before voting against final passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, warned that voters would come to understand who took away their health insurance coverage.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re a competent Democrat, you\u2019re going to figure out how to communicate to them how it affects their lives,\u201d he said that summer<\/a>. \u201cAnd it almost certainly will.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Less than a week out from the 2026 midterms, Republicans across the country are feeling the heat from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":661754,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[163,1541,521,85,46,211941,4555,238],"class_list":["post-661753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-midterm-elections-2026","tag-policy","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=661753"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661753\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/661754"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=661753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=661753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=661753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}