A top federal official in charge of negotiating with Gov. Brian Kemp on Georgia’s high-stakes health care proposals visited Atlanta on Tuesday to talk about maternal health and other topics.
But Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator, had no answers for when any of the half-million adults uninsured under current Georgia Medicaid rules might have a pathway to coverage.
Kemp and Brooks-LaSure didn’t even meet. A Kemp spokeswoman said the governor’s office got no invitation for a meeting.
It’s been more than a year since the Trump administration stamped a last-minute approval on two of Kemp’s health care “waiver” plans as Donald Trump’s presidential term drew to a close. And it’s been several months since President Joe Biden’s administration raised concerns and paused the plans.
Meanwhile, half a million Georgians remain uninsured in the “coverage gap”: too poor for subsidized ACA exchange insurance under federal law, and ineligible for Medicaid under current Georgia rules.
Both sides say they’re still in talks.
