Healey administration officials on Thursday sought to sooth anxieties around the incoming Trump administration and potential federal threats to health care for people with disabilities.
President-elect Donald Trump has promised to extend his tax cuts when he takes office again this year, and some conservatives have proposed cuts to Medicaid to reduce federal spending. Medicaid costs taxpayers about $800 billion a year, and many people with disabilities are reliant on the insurance for their care.
Additionally, Project 2025 — led by the Heritage Foundation and written by many conservatives who worked in or with incoming President Donald Trump's administration — calls for eliminating or reducing federal oversight of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Trump says Project 25 is not a blueprint for his second term.
"Following the November election, many in our community are feeling scared and vulnerable," Maura Sullivan, president of the Arc of Massachusetts, a disability advocacy organization, said during a webinar on Thursday.
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Members of Healey's administration present for the forum run by the Arc said they understood people's concerns, and were determined to protect individuals with disabilities — but also emphasized that dismantling Medicaid or the ADA may be more easily said than done.
"As we look at some of the promises made around the campaign trail, we are a little bit worried, especially Medicaid funding. Medicaid is sort of our foundation for people with disabilities," Sullivan said. "We have struggled in the last couple years too worrying about funding coming in on the state level for MassHealth and some of our [long-term services and supports] programs. But now we're really concerned."
Mary McCauley, executive director of the Massachusetts Office on Disability, responded that cutting Medicaid would be a heavy political lift for Trump.
"There's a complexity," McCauley said. "Something may have been stated on the campaign trail, it could be a fairly simple statement, but that simple statement would mean multiple actions at a variety of levels to make it happen."
Mary Hill, undersecretary of human services at the Executive Office of Health and Human Services, added that Medicaid is a popular program around the country.
"We have a lot of other states that have an investment in this. When I think about moving forward, I think it's really important as a new administration comes in, and again, whoever comes in, to really work on common ground. Where can we partner and what are issues we share?" Hill said.
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MassHealth — the state's version of Medicaid — also offers home and community based services (HCBS) waivers for individuals who get long-term care services in their home or community, who would otherwise require care in an institutional facility.
Department of Developmental Services Acting Commissioner Sarah Peterson addressed concerns that these types of waivers, specifically, could be cut.
"We're one of 47 states that operates [these] waivers, and so I'm hopeful that the incoming administration will really see this as a human issue and not a partisan issue, because we're talking about a huge segment of the country that would be potentially impacted — particularly if it comes to waiver services," Peterson said.
Officials reiterated throughout the webinar that the Healey administration would do what it could to safeguard disability rights, and that they recommended a "wait and see" approach to Trump's disability policy.
Gov. Maura Healey and her team are also under pressure to support state services, with advocates for personal care attendants warning her against proposing cuts again and supporters of home care services pressing the state to shore up accounts that are running out of money.
Beacon Hill decision makers in recent years have picked up major costs associated with free school meals that were launched by the federal government, but face fiscal pressures in trying to sustain those services and other growing programs given that non-surtax revenues are forecast to grow only 2.2 percent next fiscal year.
