May 9, 2025 - Speak Up for Everyone on Medicaid
Real talk on "work requirements," #FreeBlackMamas, day of action for child care providers, and more!
Contact all members of Congress:
By phone: (202) 224-3121
By email: Congress.gov
If you have questions, comments, and especially submissions for actions, please email us at roganslisttips@gmail.com!
FIGHT BACK AGAINST MEDICAID WORK REQUIREMENTS
As House Republicans try to thread the needle on passing their spending bill without cuts to Medicaid, one provision has become more and more likely to make it into the final version of the bill: Medicaid work requirements. Trump and professed GOP “moderates” like Rep. Don Bacon have endorsed these measures, insisting they aren’t technically “cuts” at all.
Let’s be clear: “work requirements” are cutting Medicaid. That’s their whole purpose, removing people from the rolls so MAGA can save money for billionaire tax cuts. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the last major GOP work requirement proposal would kick 1.5 million people off Medicaid, and the Urban Institute has suggested it would be as many as 5.2 million among the Medicaid expansion population alone. More than 36 million individuals are potentially at risk.
They’re also based off total falsehoods about who gets Medicaid and what these new hoops will achieve. 92% of people on Medicaid work (64%), are caregivers, disabled or attending school – and some of the remaining 8% are retired. Republicans made up a fake problem so they have an excuse to kick people off their health care in the process of “solving it.”
We have already seen what happens in states that have Medicaid work requirements. The red tape, administrative errors, and confusion over compliance requirements creates an unnecessary burden that ultimately ends with many eligible recipients remaining uninsured. When they imposed these barriers in Arkansas in Trump’s first term, 18,000 people lost health insurance in just nine months – 1 in 4 of those covered by work requirements. And there was no boost to employment. Work requirements don’t make people work – they make people do paperwork and hope a bunch of them fail at it.
Let’s reach out to our members of Congress and tell them we say "no cuts to Medicaid" that includes no work requirements for Medicaid.” We can find talking points for calls and emails here or send this Resistbot message by texting SIGN PBCYTH to 50409.
If we want to go further, we can:
Push our House members to sign the discharge petition protecting Medicaid and SNAP from all cuts with language here
Share our stories of how Medicaid has impacted our lives with People’s Action Institute here
Share on social media with this kit from the Freedom Writers Collaborative here
Learn more about how many people Medicaid serves in our communities with the Medicaid Reliance Dashboard here
Join BlueVote.Org tomorrow and Working Families Power Monday to phonebank voters and encourage them to reach out to their members of Congress here and here
Find more ways to help here
MONDAY WILL BE A DAY WITHOUT CHILD CARE
Our child care system is in crisis, increasingly unaffordable and inaccessible for working parents while providers make less than a living wage. Our government’s response, all too often, has been to shrug it off, and President Biden’s effort to massively expand support for child care was blocked by Senate Republicans and Joe Manchin. Trump seems bound and determined to make things even harder, planning to kill Head Start.
On Monday, providers are taking a stand. With the support of the families they serve, some are closing their doors for the day and others are calling out sick or closing down early, standing in solidarity to make the case for affordable care and decent wages. Let’s make sure we stand with them on the 4th Annual Day Without Child Care. We can:
Find an action near us to attend here and encourage our local media to cover them
Attend a virtual rally at 8PM Monday here
Promote the day of action with this social media toolkit
Sign this pledge to add our names to providers’ demands and reach out to our elected officials at all levels of government to let them know the providers have our support
Reach out to our members of Congress using this tool to talk about child care priorities in the budget and language and scripts here to push back specifically against killing Head Start
#FREEBLACKMAMAS THIS MOTHER'S DAY
This Sunday is Mother’s Day! And while the most important thing is for us to tell the moms in our lives how much we appreciate them, this is also a good moment to remember how many moms won’t get to spend it with their kids – not because they’ve been convicted of any crime, but because they’re caught up in the criminal justice system and too poor to get out on bail. Since 2017, the National Bailout Fund, a collective of abolitionist organizations and activists who focus on pretrial detention and mass incarceration, has celebrated this day with a #FreeBlackMamas fundraiser. They’ve helped bring over 1000 moms and caregivers home to their loved ones. Let’s join the cause and consider making a donation here. We can also check out this year's partner organizations to see if there is one local to us that we can get more involved in, so we can expand our support beyond Mother's Day.
ELEVATE DEMOCRATS IN SWING STATES - MEETING TUESDAY
Swing Blue Alliance focuses on winning elections for Democrats in swing states. Right now, they have state teams in VA, PA, and ME, and they’re looking to form teams in AZ, NC, NH, and WI. Volunteers are needed to research races, candidates, and voting data; connect with on-the-ground groups; lead or co-lead for a key battleground state or district; and organize phonebanks and canvassing trips. If we are interested in learning how to get involved in making a difference in key elections, let’s join the Swing Blue Alliance virtual meeting on Tues, May 13, 7-8PM EDT.
SERVICE JOURNALISM FROM PROPUBLICA: CLAIM FILE HELPER
This free tool by non-profit news outlet ProPublica can help us gain back control of our healthcare. Their Claim File Helper helps us find out why our health insurer denied a claim, letting us customize a letter requesting the notes and documents our insurer used when deciding to deny us coverage. This is of great assistance in preparing to file an appeal! We can use the tool here and consider a donation to ProPublica here.
STATE-SPECIFIC ACTIONS
IA, ID, MN, MT: DEMAND ACCESS TO LIFE-SAVING mRNA VACCINES
Your Local Epidemiologist has alerted us that the states of Iowa, Idaho, and Minnesota are considering bills that would restrict or even criminalize mRNA vaccines—the vaccines that do so much to prevent COVID hospitalizations and deaths. Let’s do the following:
If we’re in Iowa: tell our state legislators to oppose Senate File 360, which would impose a $500 penalty on health care providers for each administration of an mRNA vaccine. This bill has already passed a Senate subcommittee.
If we’re in Idaho: tell our state legislators to oppose ID S1036, which would place a 10-year moratorium on mRNA COVID vaccines.
If we’re in Minnesota, tell our state legislators to oppose HF 3219, which would label mRNA vaccines “weapons of mass destruction” (!).
Bonus: if we’re in Montana, thank our state representatives in the House for defeating HB371, which would have banned mRNA vaccines.
KEEPING AN EYE ON…
Use this spreadsheet to call/email/write any of our representatives as often as possible. Not just your own state reps, reach out to those in other states. Be as loud as you can and share this. Use your voice and make some “good trouble.”
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/13lYafj0P-6owAJcH-5_xcpcRvMUZI7rkBPW-Ma9e7hw/edit