Category: CMS News

Stay ahead with exclusive updates from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). Delve into the latest policies, regulations, and strategic directions that influence Medicaid programs and the healthcare ecosystem.

Posted on by

CMS NEWS – Joint statement from state nurses associations on Medicaid enrollee…

CMS NEWS – Joint statement from state nurses associations on Medicaid enrollee…


COLOR CODE: 


General item, but important. Gets at main point of article= YELLOW

Has a dollar amount or number = GREEN

A specific topic that seems to be different than other topics = BLUE

Alternative Headline: Nurses Condemn Data Sharing

[MM Curator Summary]:  Nurses in WA, CA, and IL denounce the use of Medicaid data for immigration enforcement as a breach of patient trust.

==============================

The Washington State Nurses Association, American Nurses Association\California, and American Nurses Association Illinois express their profound and strong disapproval of recent actions that led to Medicaid enrollee data being shared with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), particularly in our states, where eligible residents are able to enroll in the program, regardless of immigration status. Care for non-citizens and non-permanent residents is covered by state funds.

Nurses and other healthcare providers encouraged enrollment in Medicaid to improve their health outcomes as it was a state sanctioned benefit. Patients placed their trust in us, believing this information would be used solely to support their care. Using it instead to penalize those it was intended to protect is both unethical and inhumane. It is a betrayal of trust. Nurses are staunch advocates for their patients and families, without judgment, in accordance with the Nursing Code of Ethics.

We understand that when patients can access health coverage, it stabilizes the system for patients, providers and health care organizations. The release of personal protected health information, especially in states that authorized the coverage enrollment of these individuals, is a horrific and immoral exploitation of the human right to seek health care. We wholeheartedly condemn this action, and demand that the information not be used to target any individuals.

https://www.wsna.org/news/2025/joint-statement-from-state-nurses-associations-on-medicaid-enrollee-disclosure-to-ice





Posted on by

CMS NEWS – Mississippi Medicaid appropriation increases by $58 million for new fiscal year, state support nears $1 billion

CMS NEWS – Mississippi Medicaid appropriation increases by $58 million for new fiscal year, state support nears $1 billion


COLOR CODE: 


General item, but important. Gets at main point of article= YELLOW

Has a dollar amount or number = GREEN

A specific topic that seems to be different than other topics = BLUE

Alternative Headline: Mississippi Medicaid Budget Rises

[MM Curator Summary]: Mississippi’s Medicaid budget grows by $58 million as enrollment declines and federal policy changes loom.

==============================

  • Enrollment numbers in the program are on a decline in the Magnolia State.

The Mississippi Division of Medicaid is anticipated to operate off a total budget of $8.4 billion for the new fiscal year which begins July 1. Of that total, the state’s total support sits at about $969.9 million, Senate Medicaid Committee Chair Kevin Blackwell (R) told his colleagues during the recent special session.

“In this bill, we allowed for a deficit of $60 million. Actually, the department thinks it’s going to be about … $120 [million] for next year, but all we could get was the $60 [million] out of the House,” Blackwell described.

For the previous fiscal year, the Legislature set the state support at about $911 million, meaning the new state budget will provide a $58 million increase to the division.

As with all bills this session, Blackwell said, health insurance increases for employees of the Mississippi Division of Medicaid were included in the increase.

Mississippi is one of a handful of states that has not expanded its Medicaid program for able-bodied adults as part of the Affordable Care Act.

According to reports shared by the Mississippi Division of Medicaid, there were 718,028 Mississippians enrolled in June 2024. That number is a decrease from the 904,590 reported in June 2023. According to the state department’s enrollment report from April 2025, 705,097 residents were enrolled in the program, which includes CHIP participants.

Bills to expand Medicaid were considered during the 2024 session, but none made it to the governor’s desk. No bill with that purpose was discussed on the floor of either chamber of the Mississippi Legislature this session.

However, given the proposed changes at the federal level in the Trump Administration’s “big, beautiful bill” making its way through Congress, that could change as a sticking point in Mississippi centered on work requirements. The federal legislation under consideration seeks to make work requirements a key component of the program going forward.

While Mississippi has not expanded its Medicaid program, it does receive one of the highest, if not the highest, Federal Medicaid Assistance Percentage (FMAP) match rates. The state division’s 2024 report shows the program was at 78.42 percent for fiscal year 2024. 

https://magnoliatribune.com/2025/06/13/mississippi-medicaid-appropriation-increases-by-58-million-for-new-fiscal-year-state-support-nears-1-billion/





Posted on by

CMS NEWS – AFSCME lab tech fights to save Medicaid for his patients — and his brother

CMS NEWS – AFSCME lab tech fights to save Medicaid for his patients — and his brother


COLOR CODE: 


General item, but important. Gets at main point of article= YELLOW

Has a dollar amount or number = GREEN

A specific topic that seems to be different than other topics = BLUE

Alternative Headline: Lab Tech Defends Medicaid

[MM Curator Summary]: AFSCME member Ruben Bastell urged Congress to protect Medicaid, which supports both his patients and his brother.

==============================

· Wednesday, June 18, 2025

Ruben Bastell knows what will happen to the patients he serves every day if Congress cuts Medicaid.  

“If there’s further delay in testing and diagnosis,” the senior laboratory technician and member of Local 860 (CSEA/AFSCME 1000) says, people won’t get timely treatment, “and there’ll be a lot more sickness.” 

Bastell recently travelled from New York to Washington. He joined a host of other AFSCME members who have visited the halls of Congress to urge House and Senate members to preserve funding for Medicaid, Medicare and a host of other programs people depend on. 

For Bastell, the fight is personal. His 24-year-old brother, born with kidney disease, has depended on Medicaid for years.  

“He’s able to live a full life because of the care that he receives through Medicaid,” says Bastell. 

https://www.afscme.org/blog/afscme-lab-tech-fights-to-save-medicaid-for-his-patients-and-his-brother





Posted on by

TECH – CMS commits to tech initiatives to give Medicare patients, providers easier access to health data

TECH – CMS commits to tech initiatives to give Medicare patients, providers easier access to health data


COLOR CODE: 


General item, but important. Gets at main point of article= YELLOW

Has a dollar amount or number = GREEN

A specific topic that seems to be different than other topics = BLUE

Alternative Headline: CMS Launches Health Tech Overhaul

[MM Curator Summary]: CMS is launching new health tech projects to modernize Medicare access, data sharing, and digital identity verification – all while unifying public-private healthcare partnerships. 

====================================


The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services plans to undertake several new health tech initiatives, senior leaders announced today at a closed meeting with stakeholders. 

The Department of Health and Human Services held a meeting today to discuss health tech policy and its recent request for information on health tech initiatives. CMS seems to be moving ahead with some of the initiatives it asked stakeholders to provide feedback on in its RFI — among them a national provider directory and modern identity verification for Medicare beneficiaries. 

This comes as the HHS’ health IT office announced a new leader this morning, Thomas Keane, M.D. Keane spoke at the meeting of stakeholders today at the Hubert H. Humphrey building in Washington, D.C. 

HHS leaders outlined several upcoming tech initiatives to benefit providers and patients, according to individuals who attended the meeting and spoke to Fierce Healthcare:

  1. CMS plans to build a national healthcare directory, starting with provider information. The goal of the national provider directory, a source that attended the meeting wrote, is to establish a single source of truth for provider information that others can build upon. 

Its current pilot in Oklahoma will continue and will be a model for a national directory. 

  1. CMS plans to implement a federated, modern identity verification solution to Medicare, with leaders pointing to Login.gov or CLEAR as examples. Individuals will verify their identity once and use it across multiple systems including providers and payers.
  2. CMS plans to create a type of digital insurance card for Medicare beneficiaries allowing for real-time access to coverage information for patients and providers. It will also expand patient access APIs through Blue Button and make APIs more usable and scalable.
  3. CMS will also take its Data at the Point of Care from a pilot into general availability. The program enables providers to access Medicare claims data for their patients directly within their workflow.
  4. CMS will fully participate in the trusted data exchange to better respond to patient and provider requests and create a more interoperable and patient-centric system.

CMS confirmed the new initiatives in a series of posts on X on Tuesday evening, though it did not provide any additional details on the new projects. 

Industry representatives that attended the all-day sessions with CMS and ASTP/ONC were encouraged by the discussions and believe the Trump administration will work with industry to change long standing issues with patient data exchange. 

"From what I observed and heard, this administration is committed to digital health transformation – with artificial intelligence at its core," William Charnetski, executive vice president for health system solutions and government affairs at PointClickCare, said in a statement to Fierce Healthcare. "Among the most compelling themes is the recognition that collaboration with the private sector, open communication, and interoperable data exchange must be treated as foundational, not optional."

Ryan Howells, principal at Leavitt Partners and executive director of the CARIN Alliance, echoed Charnetski’s takeaways from the event. 

"This is a once in a generation opportunity for the public and private sectors to come together to initiate meaningful policies and projects to ensure over the next decade we can modernize our data exchange ecosystem using modern internet technology standards such as APIs, digital identity solutions, applications, AI, and cloud-based systems," Howells said. "The excitement at the meeting today was palpable from all who participated and there was more energy around these topics than I’ve seen in the last decade."

Leigh Burchell, vice president of government affairs at Altera Digital Health, said that the industry needs new incentives for data sharing.

"One topic that came up repeatedly throughout the day, both on panels and in breakout sessions, was the misalignment of incentives that has undermined efforts related to health interoperability to date, but the good news is that CMS controls those levers and can take a fresh look at both carrots and sticks to incite providers to more thoroughly embrace data exchange,” Burchell said.

CMS did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication.

https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/health-tech/cms-rolling-out-new-tech-initiatives-providers-and-patients





Posted on by

CMS NEWS – States would struggle to administer food stamp benefits under Republican tax bill

CMS NEWS – States would struggle to administer food stamp benefits under Republican tax bill


COLOR CODE: 


General item, but important. Gets at main point of article= YELLOW

Has a dollar amount or number = GREEN

A specific topic that seems to be different than other topics = BLUE

Alternative Headline: States Warn SNAP Cuts Loom

[MM Curator Summary]: A Republican tax bill would shift $22 billion in SNAP costs to states, risking major benefit cuts and loss of food aid for millions.

==============================

 

WASHINGTON, June 11 (Reuters) – U.S. states will not be able to fully administer food stamp benefits for millions of the nation’s poor if a proposal in the Republican tax bill forcing them to shoulder billions of dollars in new costs is signed into law, according to state officials, local government associations and policy experts.

More than 41 million people receive benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the nation’s largest food aid program, which cost about $100 billion in 2024.

The Reuters Tariff Watch newsletter is your daily guide to the latest global trade and tariff news. Sign up here.

The tax bill passed on May 22 by the U.S. House of Representatives and backed by President Donald Trump would shift some $22 billion in administrative and benefit costs to state and local governments, according to a Reuters analysis.

Supporters of the move say it will promote accountability and reduce waste in the program. But states fear it will backfire.

"No state is going to be able to simply absorb that," Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, a Democrat, told Reuters.

Officials from North Carolina, Oregon and Michigan also said their states did not have the resources to easily take on the spending requirements in the proposal, which is now before the Senate.

Some states could be forced to shrink SNAP eligibility or to leave the program altogether, according to letters sent in May to Congressional and agriculture committee leadership from state and county legislatures and health officials.

"Shifting the financial burden of SNAP onto states is fiscally unsustainable and risks harming the very individuals and families the program is designed to support," said one letter from the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Other letters were sent by the National Association of Counties, National Association of County Human Services Administrators and the American Public Human Services Association.

A USDA spokesperson said that Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins supports Trump’s agenda and that the agency will continue to provide technical assistance to states.

Republicans have long supported reduced spending on SNAP, arguing that the program creates a dependence on federal support and should be more narrowly targeted to the most vulnerable.

Reuters could not reach a representative from the Republican Governors Association or from Texas, Florida or Georgia, the Republican-led states facing the highest SNAP costs.

STATES WOULD STRUGGLE

The House bill would require states for the first time to pay for a portion of SNAP benefits beginning in 2028, with their payment share from 5% to 25% tied to the state’s error rate, a USDA measure of how accurately states determine eligibility and benefit levels.

Nationwide, that would amount to more than $20 billion in spending, according to a Reuters analysis of data from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The bill would also require states to immediately pay 75% of the cost of administering the SNAP program, up from their existing 50% obligation, adding another $2 billion to the sum, according to USDA data.

The states facing the most new spending would be California ($3.7 billion), New York ($2.1 billion), Florida ($1.7 billion) and Texas ($1.2 billion).

The state spending requirements would push 1.3 million people off of SNAP in an average month, because some states would modify eligibility requirements or stop administering SNAP, according to a May 22 letter from the Congressional Budget Office to House and Senate agriculture committee leadership.

Michigan does not have the ability to support $850 million in new SNAP spending and may need to restrict eligibility or reduce benefits if the House bill passes, said Elizabeth Hertel, director of the state Department of Health and Human Services.

Oregon would struggle to absorb more than $477 million and the state is planning for what they would do if forced to take on the spending, said Claire Seguin, director of the division of the Oregon Department of Human Services that administers SNAP.

North Carolina is already budget constrained and "there isn’t really a way to backfill" more than $650 million in new SNAP spending, said Department of Health and Human Services secretary Dev Sangvai, who did not provide details on what steps the state would take if the provision passes.

New York also cannot absorb its projected costs, Barbara Guinn, Commissioner of the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance, told Senators during a June 4 forum on the SNAP proposal.

Because most states must balance their budgets and cannot accrue debt to offset new spending like the federal government can, shifting SNAP spending to states risks drawing down resources from other public programs like Medicaid, said Eric Mitchell, president of the Alliance to End Hunger.

The bill would also expand work requirements for some SNAP recipients and restrict states’ ability to waive those requirements when unemployment ticks up, which together would push another 3.2 million people off of SNAP in an average month, according to the CBO.

Reporting by Leah Douglas in Washington; Editing by Alistair Bell

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

Washington-based award-winning journalist covering agriculture and energy including competition, regulation, federal agencies, corporate consolidation, environment and climate, racial discrimination and labour, previously at the Food and Environment Reporting Network.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/states-would-struggle-administer-food-stamp-benefits-under-republican-tax-bill-2025-06-11/