Prodded by Trump, House Republicans want cuts many say will eviscerate medical safety net

BENJAMIN J. HULAC, WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT | MAY 14, 2025 | HEALTH CARE, BUDGET

WASHINGTON — Without speaking, Congressman Tom Kean (R-7th) walked past dozens of people in wheelchairs, disability advocates protesting Medicaid cuts, who lined the halls outside the hearing room, snaking down the corridor and around the corner, before he went inside.

About an hour later Tuesday, once the hearing before the Energy and Commerce Committee began, Kean was not in the room when Nanette Barragán, a Democratic congresswoman from California, introduced Sasha Kirilenko, 23, a guest of hers and a student at Raritan Valley Community College from Kean’s congressional district.

After she introduced Kirilenko, Barragán urged her Republican colleagues to vote against legislation the committee picked up Tuesday and debated into the night.

To block the bill would require a handful of votes from Republicans.

“I hope we can find them,” said Barragán. “I hope one of them is your congress member,” she said to Kirilenko.

The committee’s bill is part of a sprawling mega bill Republicans are ushering through Congress to cut federal money from health, education, climate, food and social programs and slash taxes, largely for corporations and the wealthy.

Republicans in the House scheduled hearings for Tuesday afternoon and night to debate and vote on food benefits, Medicaid and taxes — three closely-watched portions of the larger bill.

As of late Tuesday, the Energy and Commerce was in the midst of its marathon hearing with members predicting it would last longer than 24 hours.

The portion of the bill Energy and Commerce started debating Tuesday would remove more than 8 million people from Medicaid, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, while also cutting federal climate programs.

Debate and votes on the overall legislation will continue for weeks and potentially months.

By using a procedure called “budget reconciliation” to avoid the Senate’s filibuster — a self-imposed policy that requires 60 votes to move legislation to a vote — Republicans can pass the big bill without Democratic votes.

Democrats are trying to derail Republicans’ bill by filing amendments, but Republicans have the votes to defeat them.

That leaves Democrats with one primary method to oppose the bill: public opinion.

Guests like Kirilenko are central to that strategy. Without Medicaid, a 60-year-old program the U.S. government administers with states, her life would change. “Transportation wise, college wise, everything,” she said in an interview with NJ Spotlight News.

“I wouldn’t be independent at all,” she said. “I’d have to be stuck with my mom again.”

Barragán said her office learned about Kirilenko through a disability rights group, leading her office to the group Disability Rights New Jersey.

Kirilenko was born with cerebral palsy, a condition that affects movement and posture. “[The] right side of my body does not function, due to a stroke I had while in my mother’s womb,” she wrote in a pamphlet advocates circulated.

“She beat the odds,” Barragán said of Kirilenko in an interview with NJ Spotlight News. “Her mother was told, ‘she’s not going to walk,’ and she walked. ‘She’s not going to talk,’ and she talks. Her mother was told, ‘she couldn’t swim,’ and now she’s a swimmer.”
Medicaid helped make that happen, Barragán said. “Medicaid has played a huge role.”

Republicans on the committee disputed that the bill would remove anyone from Medicaid enrollment who could be there legally.

The bill does not cut Medicaid “for the Americans who truly need it,” said Erin Houchin, a Republican from Indiana. “What we are doing is eliminating waste, fraud and abuse.”

Republicans, including New Jersey Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-2nd), have supported strengthening work requirements for Medicaid enrollees.

Nearly two-thirds of Medicaid members work, research by the non-profit health policy group KFF has found, with 44% employed full-time and 20% with part-time jobs. Another 12% are considered caregivers, 10% are disabled or seriously ill and 7% are in school. That leaves approximately 8% who are unemployed, KFF found.

While more than a dozen states have received federal approval for Medicaid work requirements – many under the previous or current Trump administration – only Georgia now has this policy in place, according to KFF, a national healthcare policy researcher. Arkansas, which has since ended its program, lost 11% of its Medicaid members – about 18,000 people – when it implemented work requirements in 2018.

New Jersey’s Cover All Kids program uses state funds to provide Medicaid coverage to children whose parents qualify for the program economically but are not legal residents of the country. Roughly 47,000 children are enrolled in the New Jersey program, less than 6% of the 867,000 children in the state’s Medicaid program. It is expected to cost $164 million in the fiscal year that begins in July, according to budget documents.

Nearly 700,000 members of New Jersey’s Medicaid program, which is about 1.9 million people, are considered ‘able-bodied’ adults and could lose their coverage if work requirements are implemented, according to estimates from state officials who oversee the program.

At the hearing start, Medicaid advocates shouted against potential cuts.

Their chant pierced the closed hearing room doors: “Don’t cut Medicaid….Don’t cut Medicaid…Don’t cut Medicaid!”

Protestors a few times disrupted the proceedings before U.S. Capitol Police officers escorted them out.

“You will kill me!” screamed one woman in a wheelchair at a Republican who said Medicaid would not be cut. She’s HIV positive, she said. “I am on meds that are $10,000 a month.”

Police removed her. “You will not lose your Medicaid,” said Alabama Republican Gary Palmer. “We’re trying to save Medicaid.”

— Lilo H. Stainton contributed reporting.