MO Senate Sides with House; Chooses Not to Fund Medicaid Expansion
April 30, 2021 6:54AM CDT
Missouri State Capitol. Photo by Office of Administration, Commissioner’s Office.
The Missouri Senate has passed a 34-billion dollar state budget proposal without funding a voter-approved expansion of Medicaid. Republicans Justin Brown, Mike Cierpiot (seer-poy), Lincoln Hough (huff), and Caleb Rowden sided with Democrats and supported expansion funding, but that was still not enough to restore the money. During debate on the spending plan, Rowden, the Senate Majority Leader, says he has voted against expansion many times, but he says that’s not the question.
Lake St. Louis Republican Bob Onder calls expansion “fiscal insanity of a welfare program.”
A group of House and Senate members will start negotiating their budget differences early next week.
