Yesterday, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) announced that 41 senators would stand strong and support Medicaid during the ongoing budget deficit and debt ceiling negotiations.  This is welcome news given the increased focus on Medicaid lately as the potential source of savings to rein in the deficit and cut a deal on the debt ceiling.  All of us who work on Medicaid issues know that Medicaid is already an extremely lean program that is the “MVP of children’s health coverage”, as my colleague Jocelyn Guyer recently put it.

Senator Rockefeller and his colleagues are applauded for taking a stand saying they oppose any “reckless efforts” to slash Medicaid including caps, and block grants and are calling on the White House to do the same.  They cited a number of important reasons as to why they want the President to stand up for Medicaid during the ongoing negotiations including:

• Medicaid provides health coverage to 68 million low-income children, parents, pregnant women, people with disabilities, and seniors.
• Medicaid covers 40 percent of births, 62 percent of long-term care costs, and, along with CHIP, 34 percent of the children in our country.

It is important for all of us to recognize Senator Rockefeller for his strong leadership on this issue and to thank his colleagues for taking this stand.  This is only the beginning of a long and arduous battle to defend Medicaid.

You can see the full press release from yesterday’s announcement and see the full list of Senators who have signed the letter or sent their own letter on this issue to President Obama here.