Federal Medicaid unwinding trial delayed

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A federal trial challenging how the Gov. Ron DeSantis administration removed people from Medicaid is being postponed until a later date.

U.S. District Judge Timothy Corrigan over the weekend posted a note in federal court files stating that U.S. District Judge Marcia Morales Howard had a death in her family. He stated that as a result, the trial could not move forward as scheduled and that a status conference would be held to reset the date.

The lawsuit filed in Jacksonville was brought by several people who have been part of the Medicaid program against top officials who help oversee the program centers on whether or not the administration properly notified individuals about their termination from the safety net health care program.

During COVID-19, the federal government increased funding to states for Medicaid but mandated that the states could remove people while the emergency was in place. Congress authorized states to resume checking eligibility of enrollees in Spring 2023. Since that time Florida has seen its Medicaid rolls go from 5.77 million people to 4.67 million as of March of this year.

The lawsuit was first filed last August and those that sued want Howard — who was appointed by President George W. Bush — to find that the notices used by Florida violated federal law and due process rights. The lawsuit also seeks to prevent Florida from using its current notice process as well as reinstate to Medicaid those previously removed until a new more detailed process is put in place.

Lawyers for the Department of Children and Families and Agency for Health Care Administration maintain that the state’s handling of Medicaid enrollees was done in a “permissible” and “reasonable means of communicating.” 

There are 4.16 million fewer children enrolled in government-paid health care programs after COVID 19-related coverage protections were lifted, according to a recently released analysis from the Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy Center for Children and Families. Nearly 600,000 of those children live in Florida.

The analysis shows that Florida ranks second behind Texas in a listing of states with the largest enrollment declines in Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), better known as Florida KidCare. More than 1 million children lost coverage in Texas as that state unwound pandemic-related requirements that kept people enrolled in Medicaid.