This week, a new report on Medicaid expansion showed that since Governor Mills expanded MaineCare in 2019, Maine’s uninsured rate among those eligible for Medicaid dropped by 5 points, the nation’s third largest decline between 2018 and 2020. During that time, the overall uninsured rate in Maine has also dropped significantly, and more than 95,000 Maine people have used MaineCare expansion to finally access health insurance, after having that access blocked for eight long years by Governor Paul LePage.
LePage spent the entirety of his governorship preventing MaineCare expansion, even continuing to block the expansion after Maine people overwhelmingly voted for it in a 2017 referendum. Now that the expansion has been implemented tens of thousands of Mainers are finally able to access affordable health care, LePage has doubled down, saying “expanding Medicaid—it’s bad for everybody.” If he’s elected this November, it’s clear the life-saving expansion of health care could be at risk.
“MaineCare expansion has been a literal life-saver for tens of thousands of Maine people, and we have Governor Mills to thank for that,” said Misha Linnehan, spokesperson for the Maine Democratic Party. “We’ve done so much in the last four years to make sure that every Mainer has access to the health care they need and deserve. We can’t let LePage take it all away.”