Medicaid vote creates GOP's Most Wanted

As Gov. Rick Snyder pressures Senate Republicans to hold a vote on Medicaid expansion when they briefly return to the Capitol on Wednesday, the folks at the Mackinac Center are treating House Republicans who supported the plan as the GOP’s Most Wanted.

In a multi-part series on their Capitol Confidential web page, the Mackinac Center is running mug shots of pro-Medicaid Republicans and publishing their attempts to explain why they had the audacity to vote for the Obamacare extension of Medicaid to those living at or below 133 percent of the poverty level.

I like the response given by Rep. Margaret O'Brien of Kalamazoo County, who said conservatives who are obsessed with giving President Obama a black eye have ignored the policy implications of voting against the governor’s “Healthy Michigan” plan, which features the extension of Medicaid to more than 400,000 poor adults.

"Voting 'no' might contribute to the accelerated demise of Obamacare . . . but this is far from a sure thing, especially as Michigan tax dollars would subsidize other states health care," O'Brien said.

"However, voting 'no' would definitely have resulted in many negative consequences for Michigan. It would have ignored hardworking taxpayers with low incomes and missed an opportunity to secure real reforms in a system in much need of improvement for the taxpayers who support it.

"Simplifying this issue into a verdict regarding President Obama's health care plan ignores the challenges of increasing health care costs, the highly regulated health care system and the hardworking families without health insurance," she said.

Apparently, of special interest to the Mackinac crew – and the tea party people who are eating up this series of stories  -- is that O’Brien represents a key district, one that is just 54 percent Republican. After the 2011 gerrymandering, that’s about as close as one can get to a Michigan swing district.

According to Capitol Confidential, Inside Michigan Politics editor/publisher Bill Ballenger said he thinks time could be on the side of House members who voted for the expansion, but only if the bill never gets enacted.

"If the expansion never takes place, I think there will probably be enough time between now and the next election for Republican primary voters to more or less forgive a vote like this one," Ballenger said. "But if the expansion were to happen, I think some of the House Republicans who voted for it could be in trouble."

Meanwhile, the Republican governor has launched a road show, giving a series of speeches blasting his GOP colleagues in the Senate. Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville, R-Monroe, has convened a GOP work group to study the bill this summer and he is sounding like a September vote is a certainty.

If the Republican supermajority in the Senate votes for the Medicaid bill, I suspect the Mackinac folks' heads will explode.