Making Sense of Federal Funding Cuts in New York
A Q&A about federal funding cuts
A Q&A about federal funding cuts
New York can protect its Medicaid system from Trump’s cuts – but it needs to act now.
Read Full Report By Bailey Hu, Health Policy Analyst, & Michael Kinnucan, Director of Health Policy Prior to the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2010, small business employers in New York and other states often had difficulty buying affordable health insurance, especially if their employees were in poor health. The ACA helped provide better options for workers and their families by regulating offerings in the "small group" health insurance market, which serves businesses with up to 100 [...]
Yesterday, in a 51-49 vote, Senate Republicans passed the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA), which, if passed by the House this week, will increase the national debt by approximately $4 trillion while leaving 11 million more Americans uninsured by 2035. The bill is significantly more draconian in its Medicaid cuts than the version passed by the House in May, cutting the program by $1 trillion over 10 years, rather than the $800 billion proposed in the House bill.
The OBBBA could threaten one of the signature accomplishments of the ACA: Creating a viable individual insurance market in which middle-class people can purchase high-quality insurance at a reasonable price.
70 of New York's 156 hospitals are at risk of closure from federal Medicaid cuts
Over 100 organizations signed a letter calling on Congress to protect the essential plan, which provides health insurance to 1.6 million New Yorkers.
While most coverage of the Republican reconciliation proposals has focused on Medicaid, the largest financial impact on New York’s healthcare system comes from another program – the Essential Plan. The current House Republican budget proposal threatens to cut the program by $7.6 billion or 57 percent, while increasing state Medicaid costs by $2.7 billion.
A reduction of $10 billion in federal Medicaid funding would result in the direct loss of over 78,000 jobs in healthcare across the state and over 136,000 additional jobs lost through economic spillovers.
In this emergency briefing, FPI's health policy director, Michael Kinnucan, discusses the current budget reconciliation proposals to cut Medicaid and how these policies will impact New York State.
In February, Congressional Republicans – including all seven New York representatives – voted for a budget reconciliation package requiring $880 billion in cuts to Medicaid over the next ten years. The reconciliation package set an overall target for spending reductions, but didn’t announce what specifically would be cut from the program. This week, House leadership finally revealed which program areas will be targeted.
FPI presented a briefing on the New York State budget for fiscal year 2026.
Republicans have argued that they can cut Medicaid without cutting services to vulnerable populations by cutting “waste, fraud and abuse”; by targeting people who are not, or in their view should not be, eligible for the program; and by reforming complex state financing mechanisms like provider taxes.
The Trump Administration Just Cut Hundreds of Millions of Dollars a Year from New York’s 1115 waiver – and that could be just the beginning
New York State legislators have the opportunity to address private sector healthcare affordability by passing the Fair Pricing Act (S.705/A.2140). The act would address the root cause of rising healthcare costs by regulating hospital prices, which are the key driver of spiraling healthcare inflation.