Mississippi Today

House Republicans reject Medicaid expansion on floor, say plan to aid hospitals is coming

Published

2 years ago

February 16, 2023

House Republicans reject Medicaid expansion on floor, say plan to aid hospitals is coming

by Bobby Harrison, Mississippi Today
February 15, 2023

The House Republican majority rejected a Medicaid expansion amendment on the floor Wednesday that supporters said would aid the state’s struggling hospitals.

The amendment, offered Wednesday by House Minority Leader Rep. Robert Johnson, D-Natchez, would have prevented the appropriation for the Mississippi Division of Medicaid from going into effect until Medicaid was expanded to provide health care coverage for the working poor.

The amendment was supported by 41 Democrats and one independent. Five Republicans and one independent did not vote.

Since the vote was on the budget for the Division of Medicaid, Democrats could not offer an amendment mandating the expansion of Medicaid. Instead, under provisions of the Mississippi Constitution, only conditions can be placed on budget bills, such as the money cannot be appropriated to the agency until Medicaid is expanded.

The Johnson amendment also would have mandated that the Division of Medicaid could not be funded until funds were committed:

For neonatal intensive care in the Delta.
To prevent the closure of hospitals in immediate danger of closing.
To restore services for a burn center in Hinds County.

Johnson told his colleagues that in the past few days, his mother had to be rushed to the hospital late at night.

“What I was thankful for is that a brick-and-mortar hospitals with doctors and nurses were right there in Adams County,” Johnson said, adding his mother is recovering. He said that there are areas in the state where health care is not as accessible. Citing reports that 28 hospitals or more in Mississippi are on the brink of closure, Johnson said there could be more areas in the state where health care would not be as readily accessible.

“This is the hill I am going to die on this session,” said Johnson. “It is the hill I am going to stay on … It is a matter of life and death.”

Thirty-nine states have approved the expansion of Medicaid with another, North Carolina, currently debating the issue in its legislature.

The Mississippi Hospital Association and many state health care groups have advocated Medicaid expansion as a method to help struggling hospitals and to provide health insurance to primarily the working poor in the state.

Republican leaders — primarily House Speaker Philip Gunn and Gov. Tate Reeves — have staunchly opposed expansion, describing it as a welfare program. Plus, they claim the state cannot afford to pay for the expansion.

But multiple studies have concluded that in Mississippi, Medicaid expansion, with the federal government paying the bulk of the cost, would be a boon to both the state economy and state coffers.

Democrats continually pressed Rep. Joey Hood, R-Ackerman, who handled the budget bill Wednesday and chairs the Medicaid Committee, about Republicans’ plan to address the health care crisis in the state. They said the crisis included the poor health condition of many of the state citizens, who lack insurance, and the financial crunch facing many hospitals.

Hood repeatedly said the leadership is continuing to work on a possible solution.

“We are going to do what we can to help Mississippi hospitals,” Hood said, indicating that the leadership might propose state grants for hospitals instead of pulling down federal funds through Medicaid expansion.

The legislative leadership is just beginning the process of passing a budget to fund state government for the upcoming fiscal year, which starts July 1. The more than 100 budget bills being passed this week in both the House and Senate are nothing close to the final product that the membership will be asked to vote on during the final days of the session.

Democrats said their votes on Wednesday were opportunities for rank-and-file House members to provide input in the budgeting process. But the members of the House majority rejected those pleas, opting to not buck their leaders, who ultimately will make the final decision just before the session ends in late March.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Mississippi Today

On this day in 1906

Published

4 hours ago

January 22, 2025

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2025-01-22 07:00:00

Jan. 22, 1906

Willa Beatrice Brown served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Civil Air Patrol. Credit: Wikipedia

Pioneer aviator and civil rights activist Willa Beatrice Brown was born in Glasgow, Kentucky.

While working in Chicago, she learned how to fly and became the first Black female to earn a commercial pilot’s license. A journalist said that when she entered the newsroom, “she made such a stunning appearance that all the typewriters suddenly went silent. … She had a confident bearing and there was an undercurrent of determination in her husky voice as she announced, not asked, that she wanted to see me.”

In 1939, she married her former flight instructor, Cornelius Coffey, and they co-founded the Cornelius Coffey School of Aeronautics, the first Black-owned private flight training academy in the U.S.

She succeeded in convincing the U.S. Army Air Corps to let them train Black pilots. Hundreds of men and women trained under them, including nearly 200 future Tuskegee Airmen.

In 1942, she became the first Black officer in the U.S. Civil Air Patrol. After World War II ended, she became the first Black woman to run for Congress. Although she lost, she remained politically active and worked in Chicago, teaching business and aeronautics.

After she retired, she served on an advisory board to the Federal Aviation Administration. She died in 1992. A historical marker in her hometown now recognizes her as the first Black woman to earn a pilot’s license in the U.S., and Women in Aviation International named her one of the 100 most influential women in aviation and space.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Mississippi Stories Videos

Mississippi Stories: Michael May of Lazy Acres

Published

20 hours ago

January 21, 2025

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – rlake – 2025-01-21 14:51:00

In this episode of Mississippi Stories, Mississippi Today Editor-at-Large Marshall Ramsey takes a trip to Lazy Acres. In 1980, Lazy Acres Christmas tree farm was founded in Chunky, Mississippi by Raburn and Shirley May. Twenty-one years later, Michael and Cathy May purchased Lazy Acres. Today, the farm has grown into a multi seasonal business offering a Bunny Patch at Easter, Pumpkin Patch in the fall, Christmas trees and an spectacular Christmas light show. It’s also a masterclass in family business entrepreneurship and agricultural tourism.

For more videos, subscribe to Mississippi Today’s YouTube channel.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Mississippi Today

On this day in 1921

Published

1 day ago

January 21, 2025

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2025-01-21 07:00:00

Jan. 21, 1921

George Washington Carver Credit: Wikipedia

George Washington Carver became one of the first Black experts to testify before Congress.

His unlikely road to Washington began after his birth in Missouri, just before the Civil War ended. When he was a week old, he and his mother and his sister were kidnapped by night raiders. The slaveholder hired a man to track them down, but the only one the man could locate was George, and the slaveholder exchanged a race horse for George’s safe return. George and his brother were raised by the slaveholder and his wife.

The couple taught them to read and write. George wound up attending a school for Black children 10 miles away and later tried to attend Highland University in Kansas, only to get turned away because of the color of his skin. Then he attended Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa, before becoming the first Black student at what is now Iowa State University, where he received a Master’s of Science degree and became the first Black faculty member.

Booker T. Washington then invited Carver to head the Tuskegee Institute’s Agriculture Department, where he found new uses for peanuts, sweet potatoes, soybeans and other crops.

In the past, segregation would have barred Carver’s testimony before Congress, but white peanut farmers, desperate to convince lawmakers about the need for a tariff on peanuts because of cheap Chinese imports, believed Carver could captivate them — and captivate he did, detailing how the nut could be transformed into candy, milk, livestock feed, even ink.

“I have just begun with the peanut,” he told lawmakers.

Impressed, they passed the Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922.

In addition to this work, Carver promoted racial harmony. From 1923 to 1933, he traveled to white Southern colleges for the Commission on Interracial Cooperation. Time magazine referred to him as a “Black Leonardo,” and he died in 1943.

That same year, the George Washington Carver Monument complex, the first national park honoring a Black American, was founded in Joplin, Missouri.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.