Gov. Terry McAuliffe
After a
tumultuous year of fighting over Medicaid expansion, Virginia lawmakers will meet again in
special session Thursday to try to resolve the issue. Gov. Terry McAuliffe called the session after concluding that he could not legally expand the program through executive action, and after
endorsing a proposal to use an Arkansas-style privatized system for using the expansion money.
With that background, lawmakers go into the special session with added impetus to make the deal: a new poll shows strong support among voters for the expansion.
Released Wednesday, the day before the General Assembly is due to reconvene in Richmond to consider expanding the health-care program for the poor and disabled, the Christopher Newport University survey found that 61 percent of voters support expansion under the Affordable Care Act and 31 percent oppose it.
Voters are evenly split about whether they trust the federal government to live up to its promise to cover most of the $2 billion-a-year cost, with 48 percent worried that Washington will not pay its share and 45 percent not worried.
The federal government has never failed to fulfill its part of the Medicaid bargain with the states, so that concern is pretty much empty. But that's one of the lines Republicans have used to justify their refusal to provide coverage to the 400,000 Virginians in the Medicaid gap. Thus, they've instilled more fear and distrust of the feds on this issue.
Nonetheless, Virginians are a lot more generous than their Republican lawmakers, resoundingly approving this coverage expansion. That, along with McAuliffe's softened stance toward compromise could bring results this time around. However, if a privatization scheme passes, it will require a waiver from the administration for final approval.