Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters Tuesday that she thinks Medicaid work requirements and automation will help offset President Trump's massive immigration crackdown, which has threatened migrant farmworkers. 'There are 34 million able-bodied adults in our Medicaid program, there are plenty of workers in America,' Rollins says.
President Trump on Tuesday threatened to impose up to 200% tariffs on pharmaceutical products imported into the U.S. 'very soon.' 'If they have to bring the pharmaceuticals into the country, the drugs and other things into the country, they’re going to be tariffed at a very, very high rate, like 200%,' Trump said during a Cabinet meeting. Trump said any tariffs would not take effect immediately.
The problems Centene appears to be having managing the costs of low-income Americans covered by Medicaid and individual plans under the ACA could only be the beginning of what's to come for more health insurers. Centene last week pulled its financial forecast for the rest of this year after an outside firm's review of data that showed subscribers in its ACA plans are sicker and need more care than the company anticipated. In addition, Centene is also seeing higher cost trends in its Medicaid business — coverage for low-income Americans the insurer helps more than two dozen states manage. On Monday, Centene rival Molina Healthcare lowered its earnings guidance for the rest of the year in the face of cost pressures in all three of the government-subsidized health insurance programs it helps manage: Medicaid, Medicare Advantage and individual coverage under the ACA.
S&P Global Ratings said it's considering cutting Centene Corp.'s credit ratings to junk, citing the health insurer's suspending its 2025 profit outlook. Centene said last week that it was withdrawing its previous forecast for its earnings for the year, because insurance market trends were veering from its assumptions, particularly in the plans it offers under the ACA. Without that information, S&P has less confidence that the insurer will build the capital it needs quickly enough, the bond grader said in a statement on Monday.
Medicaid's funding changes under the law are not scheduled to take effect until 2028, well past the upcoming 2026 midterm elections. Some work requirements could come earlier, however. They are to begin no later than Dec. 31, 2026.
More than 300 hospitals could be at risk for closure under the budget resolution signed July 4 by President Donald Trump, according to an analysis by the Cecil G. Sheps Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Even as Congress haggled over the controversial bill, a health clinic in the southwest Nebraska town of Curtis announced Wednesday it will close in the coming months, in part blaming the anticipated Medicaid cuts.