Lawmakers in Republican-led Kansas vote to expand Medicaid

Kansas’ Republican-controlled Legislature approved an expansion Tuesday of state health coverage to thousands of poor adults under the federal Affordable Care Act, which the GOP and President Trump have promised to repeal.

The state Senate voted 25-14 for a bill that would expand the state’s Medicaid program for the poor, disabled and elderly so that it would cover up to 180,000 additional nondisabled adults.

The votes reflected elections last year that put more Democrats and moderate Republican in the Legislature and years of pressure from advocates for the poor and hospitals.

The debate in Kansas had been clouded by uncertainty about what Republicans in Congress would do with health care policy as they helped Trump fulfill his campaign pledge to repeal Obama’s signature policy.

Brownback wrote in a letter with other GOP governors to congressional leaders last week that expanding Medicaid under Obama’s policies moved the program away from its “core mission” of helping the truly vulnerable.