Senate Oversight Chair Hogg asks Governor to detail facts behind claimed savings due to Medicaid privatization

DES MOINES – State Senator Rob Hogg of Cedar Rapids, chair of the Senate Oversight Committee, has requested that Governor Branstad provide for any facts which support the Governor’s claims that privatizing Iowa’s Medicaid program will save money without hurting services. The text of the letter is below:

Dear Governor Branstad:

Iowans have many objections to your effort to privatize Medicaid. Most commonly, they believe it is poorly planned, endangers health care for the 560,000 Iowans on Medicaid, will fail to fully reimburse Iowa health care providers for their work, and will thus limit access to health care and increase health care costs for all other Iowans.

You have said it will save money without hurting services. I doubt it. That’s why, as chair of the Senate Government Oversight Committee, I am formally asking you to release the evidence you used to calculate privatizing Medicaid will save the state of Iowa government $50 million in the first six months of 2016.

Governor, it is time to open your books and your records. Show Iowans and the federal government how your drive to privatize Medicaid is based on financial reality and is not just a tool to cut services for vulnerable Iowans.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Senator Rob Hogg, Chair
Senate Government Oversight Committee

—

Here is a video from last week when the governor was asked about Medicaid privatization as he held a town hall meeting in Mason City.