To fund tax cuts for the nation’s richest citizens, U.S. Rep. Doris Matsui said Friday, House Republicans have proposed cuts that would strip Denise Stephenson, Joseph Wilson and roughly 320,000 other residents in her district of some or all federal health benefits.

The Sacramento Democrat said the cuts would be devastating to not only her constituents but to millions of poor, elderly, disabled, and minor Americans who rely upon federal Medicaid coverage in both red and blue districts around the nation, too.

Medicaid, known as Medi-Cal in Califorrnia, covers health care visits for roughly a third of Californians and almost 20% of Americans, Matsui said, but the Republicans budget resolution requires that the House Energy and Commerce Committee slash $880 billion from its expenditures between 2026 and 2034.

The committee oversees Medicaid funding, and Matsui, a longstanding member, said the cuts would lead to a “devastating” loss of services.

“Half the children born in California are covered by Medi-Cal,” Matsui said. “It’s the largest payer of long-term care for older adults, including services that help people age in place and stay in their communities. It pays for a comprehensive range of mental health services, and we know how important that is.”

Medicaid is the largest spending item under the jurisdiction of energy and commerce committee, said KFF healthy policy analyst Robin Rudowitz, so many experts believe it will bear the brunt of cuts. Earlier proposals from House Republican leadership had pushed for even larger cuts by the committee, she said.

The GOP budget resolution is expected to go up for vote Tuesday, said Rudowitz, the director of the program on Medicaid and the uninsured at KFF, in a telephone interview. In fiscal year 2024, Medicaid and CHIP comprised 8% of federal spending at $584.4 billion, KFF reported.

‘The least fortunate among us’

Matsui, who held a news conference Friday at the WellSpace Health clinic on Sacramento’s Alhambra Boulevard, said she hopes Californians and all Americans will contact their congressional representatives and go to social media to share their personal stories of how the cuts could affect them and people they love. She thanked Stephenson and Wilson for agreeing to speak Friday about how Medi-Cal ensured they could get the care they needed.

Diagnosed with breast cancer in December 2023, Stephenson has gone through several courses of medical treatment – from chemotherapy to surgery to radiation and now preventive medicines.

The 57-year-old Natomas resident looked every inch the part of a breast cancer survivor at the news conference, her hair tinted pink, her nails painted pink and a crocheted pink ribbon pinned to her black turtleneck.

Stephenson signed up for Medi-Cal after her husband died unexpectedly from brain cancer in 2014. Until his death, she had gotten health insurance through her employer, but her grief left her unable to work full time, and she lost her employer-sponsored coverage. That’s when she signed up for Medi-Cal.

She recently returned to work, taking a job as a sales associate with a Natomas retailer, she said, but she hasn’t gotten enough hours yet to qualify for health insurance coverage.

WellSpace Health CEO Jonathan Porteus, who runs a network of about 30 community health centers in Sacramento, put a face on the 130,000 WellSpace patients whose Medi-Cal benefits cover their care.

“The people we serve are the least fortunate among us,” he said. “They are the people who keep our society running. They live off meager wages or none at all. They work in kitchens, clean offices, and do the manual labor that your back gave up on a long time ago. If you have lunch delivered with an app, you’ve met the people we serve. If you have someone coming in to take care of your yard, you’ve met the people we serve.”

If these patients lose their doctor, they can’t get blood pressure medication or insulin for diabetes, Porteus said, so they end up going to emergency rooms for the most expensive care, though they cannot afford to pay. It means ER’s are congested, he said, and it means increased risk of death.

Wilson, an advocate for people with disabilities, has been accessing care through Medi-Cal for most of his life. Now 35, he was diagnosed with Duchenne muscular dystrophy at age 7. The genetic disorder primarily affects boys, progressively weakening their muscles over time.

Doctors did not expect Wilson to live past his 20s, he said, but Medi-Cal has ensured he got state-of-the-art care and 24-hour caregivers to monitor his breathing. Medi-Cal paid for his breathing machine, he said, and his motorized wheelchair.

Because of Medi-Cal, he said, people with disabilities can have freedom and independence just like everyone else.

In a telephone interview after the news conference, Adriana Ramos-Yamamoto, a senior policy analyst with the California Budget & Policy Center, said it would be extremely challenging for California to make up the loss of federal dollars for Medi-Cal.

If this crucial funding is lost, Porteus said, it could mean not only loss of access to treatment for physical health conditions but also to dental services, hospice care, postpartum coverage and in-home supportive services.

Californians showed they understand the importance of funding health care for the state’s most vulnerable residents when they voted overwhelmingly last year to approve Proposition 35, creating a dedicated tax revenue stream to help fund Medi-Cal, said Francisco Silva, CEO of the California Primary Care Association, which represents hundreds of community health centers and regional clinics.

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