A campaign to expand Medicaid in Florida is postponing its efforts to place the issue on the ballot until 2028, due to a new state law that limits the process for approving constitutional amendments by voters, APNews’ Kate Payne reported last week.
“The group Florida Decides Healthcare had been working to get the measure on the 2026 ballot, while challenging the law in a federal court. That case is slated to go to trial in January,” Payne wrote.
Florida Decides Healthcare’s Executive Director, Mitch Emerson, stated that the new law was passed to sabotage efforts to bring proposed constitutional amendments before voters, according to Christine Sexton's report for Florida Phoenix.
Florida Decides Healthcare challenged many of the changes in federal court. Still, an appeals court earlier this month lifted an injunction against one of the restrictions that prevented groups from using non-citizens to gather initiative petitions, Sexton wrote.
“More than a million Floridians are in a healthcare coverage gap,” Tristan Wood reported for WFSU News. “They earn too much to qualify for Medicaid…but they cannot afford private health insurance.”
Florida is among the ten states that have not expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), resulting in billions of dollars in federal healthcare funding remaining unused, Wood wrote.
