TX district judge Reed O'Connor tossed a Biden Admin rule that would have audited Medicare Advantage overpayments. For broader context on MA overpayments & surrounding poitics, read Campbell & Morgan's 2025 JHPPL article: read.dukeupress.edu/jhppl/articl... www.healthcaredive.com/news/judge-v...

Too often, health insurance directories are inaccurate, despite ability to easily schedule appointments constituting a critical determinant of health. For in-depth scholarly attention to this, read @simonfhaeder.bsky.social & Abigail Burman's 2022 piece in JHPPL. read.dukeupress.edu/jhppl/articl...

Such a surreal feeling - just facilitated my first editorial board meeting of @jhppl.bsky.social. How did I get so lucky to be working with the most brilliant (and kind) health policy scholars and former editors?!

“52% of all autocratization episodes become U-Turns, which increases to 73% when focusing on the last 30 years. The vast majority of U-Turns (90%) lead to restored or even improved levels of democracy” V-Dem data

SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in a college applicant's file is blatantly unconstitutional ALSO SCOTUS: considering race as one factor in targeting whom to detain and deport is cool cool cool

TAPPER: Hepatitis A, whooping cough, & chickenpox cases are rising in Florida. Before you made this decision to lift vaccine mandates, did your dept do any analysis of how many new cases there will be? LADAPO: Absolutely not T: You didn't even do a projection? L: It's an issue of right & wrong

The first US screwworm patient in the US comes after an increase of cases in South and Central America and the Caribbean in recent years. It highlights the importance of international cooperation on research and prevention, which has taken hits under Trump. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

So much flows from this core mistake to not prosecute Trump for insurrection in spring 2021. By the time they changed course it was too late. Media and public attention had moved on from Jan 6. And Trump had begun to reassemble Republican support.

An important insight from this article about how to fight authoritarian court-packing: the “ability of prodemocracy actors to establish a clear link between known authoritarian practices and an incumbent” is crucial. US elites didn’t take on a nakedly partisan Supreme Court and it gave us Trump.

Delighted to discover that "Candidate Positions, Responsiveness, and Returns to Extremism" is now available online from JOP 🧵 @thejop.bsky.social Gated: journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/... Ungated: mellissameisels.com/files/MM_PCP...

40% of Republicans think the COVID vaccine killed more people than the COVID virus. One in four believe that QAnon is real. No matter how far they radicalize, we are told over and over again that the people being rude to them are the problem.

"one scholar calculated that the 16 million newly uninsured would lead to over 140 000 additional deaths. Ironically, the biggest losers will be individuals and medical care providers in rural areas, President Trump’s base."

New issue of @jhppl.bsky.social just dropped (Volume 50, Issue 5). Check it out, for a set of wonderful articles on topics that span health care, opioids, paid leave, and mental health, a great representation of the diversity in JHPPL. Thread here:

CNN on Emory Shooting: Police are operating under the theory that the shooter either was sick or believed that he was sick, and blamed the illness on the covid vaccine

The idea that Republicans cleverly delayed all the pain in their megabill until after the election is untrue. As @whitneycwimbish.bsky.social shows, 1/3 of the Medicaid cuts are in place today. Several hospitals have closed programs, cut staff, or shut down. The pain is here. Important story:

Any hospital closing in the near-term was on the ropes before the reconciliation bill was signed into law. But with the bill passed, financially-vulnerable safety-net providers are staring down a more difficult future. The writing on the wall matters, even when the connection isn't 100% clean.

“to avoid confusion” or to avoid lawless expulsion from the country

Medicaid is the state's largest health insurer, covering a quarter of Michigan residents. Reform supporters say the changes will eliminate loopholes.

New in @detroitnews.com: An in-depth look at Medicaid in Michigan & the potential impact of new #healthpolicy changes - complete with an interactive map of enrollment & spending & comments from our member @mshepruralpolitics.bsky.social www.detroitnews.com/story/news/p... @umichsph.bsky.social

We’re excited to share SSN’s new Medicaid Working Group, launched by @philiprocco.bsky.social! As the reconciliation bill moved forward, the group shared timely insights and will keep breaking down what it means for Medicaid & health access. Learn more about the group: scholars.org/medicaid-wor...

Medicaid cuts lead to rural Maine hospital closures and service reductions

Rural hospitals brace for financial hits or even closure under Republicans' $1 trillion Medicaid cut www.mprnews.org/story/2025/0... @ruralimpactpodcast.bsky.social @ncrsmh.bsky.social @urbaninstitute.bsky.social @aclu.org @hsph.harvard.edu

After media reports & experts warned for months that drastic & sudden cuts at the Nat Weather Service by Trump could impair their forecasting ability & endanger lives during the storm season, TX officials blame an inaccurate forecast by NWS for the deadly results of the flood.

Two hospitals in our area abruptly closed in 2024, and, between them, we lost the only adolescent in-patient mental health beds and only medically-supported alcohol/drug detox that didn’t require an hours-long transport. The comments section rhetoric somehow BLAMED Medicaid.

“rural voters who lost hospitals were roughly 5–10 percentage points more likely to vote Republican in subsequent presidential elections. If anything state Republicans seemed to benefit in rural areas from rejecting Medicaid and resulting rural health woes.” @mshepruralpolitics.bsky.social

I checked out the facebook feed of a news station reporting on the closure of a clinic in Nebraska because of this bill, and they are already blaming Democrats.

While Republicans celebrate the passage of the largest Medicaid cut in history, the Curtis Medical Center in Nebraska announced it will shut down as a result of these horrific cuts — the first of many hospitals to close. This is a dark day for rural America and for our country.

We need to start a thread where Blue Dots in Red Counties keep track of hospital and health clinic closures. I know it is already happening. Southwest Nebraska hospital announces plans to close, blames uncertainty over funding nebraskapublicmedia.org/en/news/news...

I grew up in rural South Carolina with a single mom who worked multiple jobs. At times, we relied on Medicaid and SNAP—like so many others. My heart breaks for those now wondering if that help will still be there. Imagine having all that power and choosing to make people’s lives worse. Shameful.

People who think there is going to inevitably be a big pro-Dem backlash against Medicaid cuts should read this article. You have to remember there is an entire proganda apparatus that will blame the Dems for the effects of these Republican cuts. link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Here's the view of the DIE-IN in front of Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick's office building in PA-01, as seen from above. We want him to VOTE NO on Trump's Billionaire Bailout Budget Bill! Thank you to Ava Redmond for her drone work!

Elon Musk casually, and illegally, dismantled USAID. According to a new study in the Lancet, that action will lead to *14 million* premature deaths between 2025 and 2030. Again: Elon Musk is directly responsible for 14 million coming deaths. 4.5 million will be children.

The Catholic Health Association calls Trump’s snd the Republicans’ bill a moral failure H.R. 1 is a Moral Failure: Congress Prioritizes Wealthy First, Leaves Vulnerable Americans Behind

The “big, beautiful bill” will devastate rural areas and make it harder for those falling behind to ever get ahead. New Edsall article featuring @jacobhacker.bsky.social, Noam Lupu, myself and many more. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/01/o...

#Texas is a gigantic state- if you are an ED provider in a rural hospital, you are almost guaranteed to lose your job with this bill. If you are in larger urban center, your ED is going to look like a warzone in a few months, with sickest patients (delayed care, traveling hours) piled 5 beds deep

If you're an #EmergencyMedicine doctor in these states, COVID 2020 would have been walk in the park: 1. Texas (80 closures, 30 imminent) 2. Kansas (62 closures, 31 imminent) 3. Oklahoma (39 closures, 26 imminent) 4. Mississippi (35 closures, 25 imminent) www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/703-...

The “big, beautiful bill” will devastate rural areas and make it harder for those falling behind to ever get ahead. New Edsall article featuring @jacobhacker.bsky.social, Noam Lupu, myself and many more. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/01/o...

New OA article (with Al-Fahm & @mjonescorrea.bsky.social) in Political Behavior: We test if Latinx Trump supporters pulled back after reminders of his anti-Latinx rhetoric. Despite expectations, support grew in 2020. Suggesting co-ethnic attacks may matter less n/1 link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Emergency departments across the country are already breaking at the seams as things stand because too many people utilize them for primary care. The system we have cannot absorb 11.8 million people losing coverage. People will die. www.statnews.com/2025/06/29/1...

As Republicans expedite their efforts to rip health coverage from millions of Americans, re-upping my writing on the not so-beautiful bill. First, my piece in The Hill w/ @mshepruralpolitics.bsky.social on harms to rural (conservative) communities (ex: hospital closures). thehill.com/opinion/heal...

Now let’s talk behavioral health. The opioid epidemic ravaged Appalachia (where I live, and which largely voted for Trump), and Medicaid is critical lifeline for people requiring treatment for mental health and substance use disorders, as I write on in @statnews.com www.statnews.com/2025/06/12/m...

To top it all off, as I wrote in @medpagetoday.bsky.social, the bill goes against the federalism principles that Republicans have historically espoused, literally penalizing states for offering more generous health coverage with their own state funds. www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/seco...

Every major health system in Louisiana is warning Speaker Mike Johnson and the rest of the state's congressional delegation that the Senate GOP's Medicaid cuts "would be historic in their devastation." www.politico.com/live-updates...

NEW: The Senate version of One Big Beautiful Bill is one big ugly transfer of wealth from low-income families to the rich. Americans struggling to get by will pay more for groceries & health care so the highest income families can get big tax cuts. This isn’t shared sacrifice.

Republican Sen. Thom Tillis is a NO on the GOP budget bill: "I cannot support this bill in its current form. It would result in tens of billions of dollars in lost funding for North Carolina, including our hospitals and rural communities."

States can use the $ for directly providing payments to rural providers harmed by the Medicaid cuts (which is how this fund is being presented) but can also use it for many other purposes - several could instead involve profitable contracts to technology vendors (6/x)

As in the earlier specs leaked to the press, 1/2 of the $25B will be distributed *equally" among all states with an approved application irrespective of actual need. 1/2 will be distributed to states as determined by the HHS Secretary with a list of criteria (but *no specific formula*). (4/x)

There's a lot of words about what needs to go in state applications for the $ and what the $ could be used for but it's clear the HHS Secretary will have lots of discretion to approve or deny applications for the fund. Obviously this Admin will likely favor certain states over others (3/x)

The many #Medicaid cuts are permanent but this is temporary, available only for 2028-2032. It's very front loaded even though the cuts get larger over time especially for the provider tax restrictions. $20B of $25B in fund is for the first two years - $2B in 2030 & 2031 and only $1B in 2032 (2/x)