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State and federal lawmakers in Santa Rosa painted a dire picture Tuesday of the impacts of federal health care cuts under the Trump administration, including skyrocketing insurance premiums, the loss of health coverage for millions of Californians and the likely closure of rural hospitals and community clinics.
Those cuts include nearly $1 trillion to Medicaid over a decade stemming from Trump’s 2025 tax cut and spending bill, as well as the expiration of more than $32 billion in enhanced Affordable Care Act tax subsidies, state Sen. Mike McGuire said during a town hall meeting at Santa Rosa High School’s auditorium.
“That means 3 million Californians by mid 2027 will be without health care for months, if not years, until this madness is reversed,” McGuire said.
North Bay elected officials and health care advocates hold a town hall meeting on the rising cost of health care, efforts to lower costs for families, and the path forward for universal coverage Tuesday, March 10, 2026 at Santa Rosa High School. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat)
From left, Meghan Hardin, regional VP of the California Hospital Council, Gaby Bernal Leroi, CEO of Santa Rosa Community Health and Ryan Skolnick with the CA Nurses Association joined local elected officials at a town hall meeting on health care, Tuesday, March 10, 2026 at Santa Rosa High School. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat)
From left to right, Rep Mike Thompson, Rep. Jared Huffman and state Sen. Mike McGuire hold a town hall meeting on the rising cost of health care, efforts to lower costs for families, and the path forward for universal coverage Tuesday, March 10, 2026 at Santa Rosa High School. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat)
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North Bay elected officials and health care advocates hold a town hall meeting on the rising cost of health care, efforts to lower costs for families, and the path forward for universal coverage Tuesday, March 10, 2026 at Santa Rosa High School. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat)
The town hall, dubbed “American Healthcare on Life Support,” was organized by McGuire, D-Healdsburg, and U.S. Reps. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena and Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael.
All three lawmakers are vying for election this year.
McGuire, who is term limited in the Legislature, is running for the open 1st District seat in the House of Representatives — both for the remainder of the late Rep. Doug LaMalfa’s term this year and the full term starting in 2027 — while Thompson (4th District) and Huffman (2nd District) are running for re-election in redrawn districts that together with the 1st cover most of Northern California.
“We need to be blunt, the United States is spending $1 billion dollars a day on the war in Iran,” McGuire said.
“The American people are against it, yet they can pay for this war in Iran and cut all of our health care at the same time,” he said, adding that dozens of hospitals and health centers across the country will close because of federal health care cuts.
The town hall also featured a panel discussion with state and local health care leaders, including Meghan Hardin, regional vice president of the California Hospital Council; Dr. Nicole Barnett, CEO of Planned Parenthood NorCal; Gaby Bernal Leroi, CEO of Santa Rosa Community Health; and Ryan Skolnick, a community organizer with California Nurses Association.
Skolnick discussed the latest campaign to establish single payer health coverage system in the state. Assembly Bill 1900, which is sponsored by the state nurses union, would establish the California Guaranteed Health Care for All program, or CalCare, to provide comprehensive, universal health coverage. It is the third time in the past five years the union has sponsored single-payer legislation.
“The nurses have been fighting for this because nurses will not accept the system that prioritizes profits over patients,” Skolnick said.
“Our current system is not normal,” he said. “Nowhere else in the world does things the way we do here…guaranteed health care for all is the norm in many countries around the world who have far better health care than we do.”
Hardin of the California Hospital Council warned that federal health care cuts will push many struggling hospitals over a financial cliff. Hospitals have been struggling for years, she said.
“Today, 44% of hospitals in the state of California operate at a loss and about one in 10 are at risk of closing,” she said. “In the past three years alone, two California hospitals have closed entirely; 22 hospitals have shut down maternity units just to say afloat; and 12 counties are entirely without maternity care.”
Huffman and Thompson both said they were doing what they could to oppose further erosion of the federal health care safety net. They stressed the importance of Democrats taking back control of Congress in the November general election.
“You can’t take $1 trillion dollars out of health care and expect us to have any type of viable health care,” Thompson said, adding that the result will be an estimated 15 million Americans losing their coverage under Medicaid, the federal program for lower income households and disabled individuals.
Gaby Bernal Leroi, the CEO of Santa Rosa Community Health, said the Medicaid cuts represent a significant financial blow to her organization, which serves a large share of immigrants in the Santa Rosa area.
Already, much of that community has been driven further into the shadows by the federal government’s aggressive crackdown on immigration enforcement.
“Everybody is afraid, even people who are insured or are eligible are sometimes afraid to come in for care or are considering dropping their coverage for fear of the immigration consequences,” Bernal Leroi said.
Bernal pointed out that new Medicaid renewal requirements under Trump’s tax and spending law could lead to people losing their Medi-Cal coverage, the state’s Medicaid program. The law calls for revolving renewal redeterminations every six months, compared to the current annual re-enrollment requirement.
During the Q&A session of the town hall, a member of the audience raised concern about the ability of county social services workers to process twice as many Medi-Cal renewals. Sonoma County has struggled in recent years to fill gaping job vacancies in its Human Services Department.
Barnett of Planned Parenthood NorCal stressed the importance of state leadership as an antidote to federal cuts to critical services, including reproductive health care. After the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022 overturned Roe v Wade, striking down the federal right to abortion care, California took significant steps to protect abortion rights.
“Dozens of laws were introduced in the state and more than 30 were actually enacted, alongside with $200 million in state investments to strengthen access to reproductive health services,” she said.
When President Trump’s tax policy and spending bill was adopted last July, it included an immediate defunding of Planned Parenthood, one of the nation’s largest providers of reproductive health care, leaving it unable to get reimbursements tied to Medicaid patients.
California responded by providing $90 million dollars in emergency funding to keep Planned Parenthood services available.
Hardin of the hospital council warned the fraying of the nation’s safety net will affect everybody in the country. She said the loss of health coverage will lead to fewer primary and preventative care visits and, as a result, more emergency room visits.
“If you have employer provided health insurance, and you think that this won’t touch you, it will,” she said. “Hospitals grow more crowded, wait times get longer and costs rise across the system. This becomes an everyone problem.”
You can reach Staff Writer Martin Espinoza at 707-521-5213 or martin.espinoza@pressdemocrat.com.