KOLO: Nevada lawmakers sound alarm on Medicaid cuts

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By Terri Russell

Newborn in hospital nursery

RENO, Nev. (KOLO) -In the evening hours of February 25, 2025, Republican Congressmen and women voted to advance a multi trillion-dollar budget.

It’s now up to committees to work out where proposed cuts will go and by how much.

While no specifics have been released at this time, here in Carson City lawmakers and stakeholders are sounding the alarm.

“We don’t have all the answers just yet, but we learn more every day that these cuts will devastate families,” says Nevada Senate Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro. “Devastate their economic security, cause chaos for our health care providers and cost our state budget billions of dollars.”

Senator Cannizzaro says 300,000 Nevadans will immediately be impacted by the cuts.

Nearly 50% of all babies born in Nevada are through the Medicaid system. Those with disabilities and nursing home patients receive Medicaid as well.

But that doesn’t begin to include health care providers, hospitals, and clinics who are paid for their services through the program.

The CEO of High Sierra Industries wanted to dispel beliefs that Medicaid recipients don’t work.

“Do you know where they work?” asked LaVonne Brooks. “Walmart, they work at Amazon, they work cleaning rooms. Their employers do not pay for their health care benefits.”

The cuts threaten state budgets to the tune of $1.9 billion. Nevada cannot hope to make up the difference. Lawmakers asked for their Republican colleagues and the governor to join them.

These cuts they say are real and not hypothetical to the tune of $800,000,000,000 dollars.

“And the committee tasked with finding that amount of money actually oversees the spending of Medicaid dollars,” says Senator Cannizzaro. “So, we are talking about a very real budget plan. That is gaining traction that they are passing resolutions to start to hear. So, this is not speculative.”

Senator Cannizzaro says it’s extremely difficult setting up a budget for the next two years in Nevada, not knowing one day to the next if Medicaid funds will be available. She says they will carry on as if those funds are available. And adjourn with a balanced budget according to law.

However, she says should those federal funds dry up after that, a special session will be called where that money can be made up on a state level.