Mississippi: Coalition of organizations ramping up for major Medicaid expansion push

Mississippi is one of the ten states where ACA Medicaid expansion still hasn't gone through a full decade after it could have.

A few years ago, Medicaid expansion in Mississippi looked like it might actually happen: While the states GOP Governor and Republican supermajority-controlled state legislature opposed it, in May 2021 there was a strong grassroots effort to put a statewide initiative on the ballot to push it through regardless, exactly how it happened in other deep red states like Utah, Nebraska, Idaho and South Dakota.

Unfortunately, just a few weeks later, the Mississippi Supreme Court crushed that effort:

In May 2021, the Mississippi Supreme Court ruled invalid a citizen-sponsored initiative to approve medical marijuana. In doing so, the 9-member elected Supreme Court also ruled invalid the entire initiative process. That decision halted the effort of Medicaid expansion supporters, including the Mississippi Hospital Association, to garner the required number of signatures needed to place the initiative on the November 2022 ballot.

Legislators said during the 2022 session they would fix the language that led to the Supreme Court ruling the initiative process invalid and reinstate it. But in the end, legislators could not agree on that fix and the session ended without legislators restoring the initiative process.

And so, Medicaid expansion in the Magnolia State appeared to be dead: The only way to make it happen is now via legislation...and Republicans have a complete lock on the legislature.

As I noted back in September, however, 2023 Democratic Gubernatorial nominee Brandon Presley made Medicaid expansion one of the cornerstones of his campaign, and while he ended up losing (by a surprisingly narrow margin), it's starting to look like the wall is starting to crack among GOP legislators:

Republican Rep. Jason White, heir apparent to the House speakership, said Medicaid expansion, long a bugaboo for the state GOP, will be on the table and at least thoroughly vetted as a solution to Mississippi’s health care crisis next year.

...Incumbent Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann has expressed openness to discussing expansion, but has not pushed the idea with Gunn and Reeves poised to block it.

...But Hosemann, who won his primary and is expected to sail to reelection in the general, plans to hold Senate health care hearings before next year’s legislative session and has also said all issues “will be on the table.”

Well, I'm not sure if this is still the case given that GOP Gov. Tate Reeves (who strongly opposes Medicaid expansion) ended up winning re-election, but it sure looks like some local organizations are preparing for a massive campaign to hold Speaker White to his word:

As Medicaid expansion remains a top political issue in Mississippi — and sure to be debated this legislative session — one group will be advocating for the policy on the front lines.

Care4Mississippi is a coalition of 36 partner organizations, and growing, focused on getting Medicaid expanded in Mississippi. 

Co-chair Kimberly Hughes, who’s also the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network’s government relations director, says this is the first time the coalition will be “active” during the legislative session, but the work on this issue began years ago. 

...Since the coalition spent the past year preparing for this legislative session, it’s coming armed with a trove of information on Medicaid expansion.

“We want to be that clearinghouse for information,” she said. “There’s momentum around this issue, in the public and the press and with some of our lawmakers, so we’ve been trying to get ready for that.”

...Researchers estimate somewhere between 200,000 and 300,000 Mississippians currently fall in Medicaid’s coverage gap — they make too much to qualify for Medicaid but can’t afford insurance on their own — and would be insured if the policy was expanded to the working poor as most other states have done. 

Stay tuned...I suspect that Mississippi, along with Georgia, will be the next two states to finally cave to common sense on this issue.