TPM - Republicans Coalesce Around Medicaid Work Requirements, Pretending It Won’t Impact Millions Of Enrollees

House Republicans are looking for ways to make sweeping cuts to Medicaid, while publicly insisting they’re not actually doing that. Enacting work requirements has emerged as one clear favorite option for the bamboozlement.

By Emine Yücel
May 1, 2025 11:41 a.m.

/snip/

Republicans have floated a handful of ways in which they can cut the cost of the program while effectively gutting Medicaid as we know it.

Aware of how unpopular cuts to Medicaid will be back home, vulnerable House Republicans have been loudly insisting they don’t want to consider options such as reducing federal funding for Medicaid expansion coverage, including reducing the federal match rate or implementing per capita caps.

But there is one option, among the many being considered, that even the most performatively anti-cut Republicans are saying they would go along with: Medicaid work requirements.

“I’m all for work requirements,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) told reporters on Wednesday as he walked down the tunnel connecting the Senate basement to the office buildings.

When asked about whether he would support exceptions to those work requirements, Hawley told TPM: “I need to see a specific proposal. But in general, I’m fine with work requirements.”

/snip