The One Big Beautiful Bill ratchets up work requirements for Medicaid. In the process it will force states to pay millions more to Equifax to verify that residents qualify for the program. Wild story by @sangerkatz.bsky.social @asmaaelk.bsky.social and Sarah Kliff www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/h...

Want to be my boss? @upshot.nytimes.com is looking for a new editor. It's a great job leading a creative, collaborative, fun team, if I do say so myself. t.co/EMsA6p7eSh

How the GOP mega-bill bill finds its savings: piling more paperwork on the poor. w/ @sangerkatz.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2025/06/29/u...

Big tax cut bills typically don't leave the poor worse off. Bills cutting the safety net don't normally include benefits for the rich. The GOP reconciliation bill is something we haven't really seen before. w/ @aliciaparlap.bsky.social + @sangerkatz.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

A Complete List of Everything in the Republican Bill, and How Much It Would Cost or Save (This very long list is now updated with Congressional Budget Office estimates) www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

A bunch of papers cited in the government MAHA report are apparently fake. www.notus.org/health-scien... ‪@emilykennard.bsky.social‬ @margaretmanto.bsky.social‬

Easily one of my favorite stories we've ever worked on. Have you ever... not gotten around to opening your mail for a week or two? That's the kind of thing that will get a low-income family kicked off benefits. The GOP reconciliation bill would ramp up such hurdles.

If you want to think more about how paperwork can prevent eligible people from getting benefits, this piece 2020 piece with @emmbadger.bsky.social has a fun quiz, a large survey, and lots of research, and features photos of our boss's mail. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Here's a complete list of *everything* in the GOP megabill, thanks to heroic efforts from @aliciaparlap.bsky.social @emmbadger.bsky.social and Josh Katz. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

NEW: Under Trump, the National Science Foundation is awarding grants at the slowest pace in decades. We took a detailed look at every area of science affected by the funding lag. Here's a gift link: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

The Medicaid work requirement in the House bill is a lot stricter than work requirements in previous legislation. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/22/u... with Sarah Kliff

If House Manager Amendment ending #Silverload is signed into law I expect numerous insurers to leave the ACA market in 2026... Pay particular attention to Texas

If a non-expansion state newly adopts expansion, hospitals/other providers see those SDPs at 110% of Medicare fall to 100%. Creates another disincentive for states to take up expansion along with other provisions including elimination of existing fiscal incentives to encourage expansion (7/x)

Scalise says 2027 is the new target date to implement Medicaid work requirements

Congress is looking at major changes to the Medicaid expansion. New research finds it has saved 27,000 lives. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/16/h...

As Congress Debates Cutting Medicaid, a Major Study Shows It Saves Lives: www.nytimes.com/2025/05/16/h...

Republicans in W&M voted down an amendment that would have permanently extended enhanced Obamacare subsidies. @repstevenhorsford.bsky.social, who introduced it, argued that if Congress was using a current policy baseline for tax cuts, it should also do so for the subsidies.

In the first 15 minutes of the E&C markup, the number 13.7 million uninsured has already come up twice. It's an exaggeration of what the GOP bill would do. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/13/u...

Read @tonyromm.bsky.social on the many the ways the Trump agenda will put pressure on state budgets. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/13/u...

My colleague Claire Cain Miller is hoping to hear from folks about challenges facing boys and young men. Please read her article and share your stories here: www.nytimes.com/2025/05/13/u...

CMS just proposed a rule to make it harder for states to increase their federal Medicaid match by taxing managed care providers. The policy is similar to a provision in the House legislation released last night. public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2025-08566.pdf h/t @newscat44.bsky.social

There's relatively little substantive content in the text of the MFN EO, but this section is emblematic of the many, many questions people should have about its scope. Where will the Secretary get this pricing information? How will they decide "price targets"? For which drugs? Which countries? Etc.

The morning after House Republicans release a plan to reduce Medicaid spending by hundreds of billions, Sen. Josh Hawley is out with an op-ed encouraging his colleagues not to cut the program. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/12/o...

Bluesky friends: Any theories about the story behind the special Tennessee DSH policy in this bill?

Read Phil Galewitz on Medicaid provider taxes, in a story that cites many individual hospitals that enjoy paying them and depend on related revenue streams. kffhealthnews.org/news/article...

Some left-leaning analysts think CBO has underestimated the insurance coverage losses that would be caused by various Medicaid cuts. Read @xpostfactoid.bsky.social for the details: xpostfactoid.blogspot.com/2025/05/cbo-...

I expect this newsletter to be dollar-positive before it becomes dollar negative. www.bloomberg.com/opinion/news...

In some states, provider taxes and related payments bring in more than a third of overall federal funding for Medicaid. If Republicans end the tactic, red states could feel the most pain.

I first learned about Medicaid provider taxes when I was covering health policy in the New Hampshire state legislature in the 2000s. Everyone called them "mediscam." www.nytimes.com/2025/05/06/u...

Fascinating story by @sangerkatz.bsky.social + Sarah Kliff on an accounting trick nearly every states uses to collect extra federal Medicaid dollars — now potentially targeted by House Republicans looking for savings. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/06/u...

World's weirdest hobby? www.nytimes.com/2025/05/02/h... @apoorvanyt.bsky.social

NEW: DOGE is falling far short of its goals — and still drastically over-stating its success. Here’s why: www.nytimes.com/2025/04/13/u...

If you want to understand the problem of "waste, fraud, and abuse" in federal health programs, you should read this great piece by Sarah Kliff and @bykatiethomas.bsky.social on scammy skin substitute companies. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/10/h...

The House passed the Senate budget. Here's what's in it. www.nytimes.com/interactive/... @aliciaparlap.bsky.social

Here's what's in the budget the House is voting on today. www.nytimes.com/interactive/... @aliciaparlap.bsky.social

Jim O'Neil, Trump's pick for deputy secretary of HHS, was until recently on the board of of the Seasteading Institute, an organization devoted to the "creation of floating ocean cities as a revolutionary solution for poor governance." www.seasteading.org

Unexpectedly for this event, Trump just promised not to cut Medicaid benefits again.

NEW: CDC FOIA page are being dismantled, including pages containing FOIA request logs and the portal to submit FOIA requests.

HHS doctors, scientists and tobacco control staff, rare disease experts, cancer drug wizards -- all fired today or leaving in recent weeks. Yet. 🚨 At HHS, staff make up less than one percent of the overall agency budget. 🚨 www.nytimes.com/2025/04/01/h...

Public health officials in Tx said they received stop work orders for three grants that helped fund their response to the raging measles outbreak Story by @apoorvanyt.bsky.social @sangerkatz.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2025/03/26/h...

Reading this Paragon report on Medicaid provider taxes, and I have a lot of questions about the art! paragoninstitute.org/medicaid/add...

What a delightful set of additions to the long tradition of reconciliation-related metaphors, of which Senator Whitehouse's "a free-range chicken that can run wherever the majority wants it to" remains my favorite. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

lmao I can’t believe they printed this

Whoa, did not know you could write a FUN story about CBO gamesmanship (I think @marcgoldwein.bsky.social's metaphor might be my fave, but they're all pretty good)

Having trouble understanding what a "current policy baseline" is? Don't worry! We have metaphors for you. www.nytimes.com/interactive/... @aliciaparlap.bsky.social with A+ illos from Maddy Fischer

#1: Popcorn www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/202...

"The picture of these shifting contracts reflects what has become the erratic hallmark of much of the team’s work" www.nytimes.com/2025/03/13/u... @emmbadger.bsky.social @ethansinger.bsky.social

NEW: DOGE backtracks on promises of transparency, making its new errors harder to find. (We found more anyway) www.nytimes.com/2025/03/13/u...

NEW: Chuck Schumer says Senate Democrats won't provide votes to pass GOP funding bill as shutdown draws near Dems say they won’t support a “partisan” House bill they lacked input in writing. Deadline: Friday midnight. www.nbcnews.com/politics/con...

Lotta money things happening in government right now--the spending bill, the budget, DOGE. We have a guide to what's what, with great @aliciaparlap.bsky.social charts: www.nytimes.com/2025/03/11/u...