Don’t expect Alabama to soon join the ranks of other GOP-led states that have signed onto Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, but Gov. Robert Bentley (R) opened the door ever so slightly in new comments reported Thursday.
“I wouldn’t be opposed to a block grant for the entire Medicaid system,” Bentley said, as reported by al.com, after saying something similar in an address to the state legislature. His answer was in response to a question about the Medicaid expansion specifically.
The idea of expanding Medicaid through a block grant is likely a non-starter for the Obama administration. Republican governors opposed to the expansion have raised the possibility before, but most analyses of a block grant’s impact on Medicaid conclude that it would cut enrollment, not expand it.
Bentley also said that he would want to require that Medicaid enrollees be employed or looking for work — another proposal that the Obama administration has scoffed at when other states brought it up — and clarified that his office isn’t actively working on any Medicaid expansion proposal.
But even rhetorical openness from Bentley, who was re-elected this fall and is now term-limited, is notable. More than 190,000 low-income Alabamans have been left uncovered because the state refused Medicaid expansion.
