Legislators can get some curious ideas when drafting legislation, particularly legislators who reluctantly decide to participate in the Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act. When Arkansas passed a law authorizing its Medicaid expansion, they included language that does its best to make damn sure beneficiaries understand that this ain’t no entitlement. The language reads:
(i) An eligible individual enrolled in the program shall affirmatively acknowledge that:
(1) The program is not a perpetual federal or state right or a guaranteed entitlement;
(2) The program is subject to cancellation upon appropriate notice; and
(3) The program is not an entitlement program.
This provision only applies to adults enrolling in the expansion, so we can assume that children and people with disabilities aren’t required to comply with this empty gesture. I’m not sure the courts or the feds would allow Arkansas to use this language as a future escape clause from the expansion. The strained legal reasoning of local conservative lawmakers doesn’t change the fact that Medicaid is an entitlement.
