Nebraska’s House representatives vote to approve budget that some fear would hurt Medicaid

All three of Nebraska’s house representatives voted to approve a budget resolution that would direct congressional committees to cut about $1.5 trillion in spending and raise the debt ceiling by $4 trillion.

The resolution calls for the House Energy and Commerce committee to cut around $880 billion by 2034. Some fear a chunk of that would come out of Medicaid funding.

While the resolution doesn’t directly mention cuts to Medicaid, the Energy and Commerce committee oversees the program. One initial holdout to the resolution was Nebraska’s second district Congressman Don Bacon.

He told Nebraska Public Media News earlier this month he thought the size of the cut was too significant.

“The experts that I have been talking to think you can only do that by significantly cutting Medicaid, and we have a lot of people depend on Medicaid,” he said in an interview on Feb. 20.

A total of 54% of Nebraskans voted for a ballot initiative to expand Medicaid in 2018. Nebraskans at or under 138% of the federal poverty line are eligible, amounting to at or below $21,600 a year for a single person, or $44,400 for a family of four.

But Bacon did vote to approve the resolution and said in a written statement after the vote he was “assured that the final bill will not affect the quality of healthcare covered by Medicaid.”

Representatives Adrian Smith and Mike Flood also supported the resolution saying they voted in favor to help minimize tax burdens on Americans.

Bacon added he knows the U.S. Senate will reduce overall cuts, so “Medicaid funding will be balanced somewhere between the House and Senate positions.”

He added he supports securing the southern border, expanding energy production, improving the military and extending tax cuts.

With the resolution now headed to the Senate, where senators have proposed their own budget plans, Sens. Pete Ricketts and Deb Fischer will vote on it next.

Ricketts said he isn't sure what the resolution will look like when it is passed on to President Donald Trump to sign.

“I would say stay tuned with regard to what the Senate is going to do with the house package. But I think almost certainly you're going to see changes to it going forward,” he said.

In total, the House-approved budget resolution calls for about $1.5 trillion in spending cuts. At the same time, it allows other committees, like the Armed Forces, Judiciary and Homeland Security, to spend more. It directs the Ways and Means Committee to raise the debt limit by $4 trillion, making way for spending increases in these areas.