EXCLUSIVE: House GOP’s Medicaid Reform Would Force Millions Of Able-Bodied Americans To Get Back To Work

House Republicans’ proposal to impose work requirements on Medicaid would force millions of Americans to meet new eligibility conditions or lose coverage, the Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.

At least 3.5 million individuals will be removed from Medicaid rolls due to House Republicans’ proposal to require most able-bodied Americans to work, volunteer or be in school for at least 20 hours a week to qualify for the entitlement program, according to a source familiar with an estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office that could be released as early as Friday. GOP lawmakers have justified the imposition of work requirements among other reforms to Medicaid by arguing that the entitlement program should prioritize Americans who need coverage the most, not able-bodied adults or illegal migrants. (RELATED: Democrats Balk At GOP Effort To Rein In Medicaid With Work Requirements)”

“We are protecting Medicaid for the people who need and deserve it,” Speaker Mike Johnson said Tuesday at the House GOP leadership press conference. “This program is an essential lifeline for our most vulnerable Americans: pregnant women, single mothers, low-income seniors, the disabled. That’s who Medicaid is intended to be for and that’s who we’re protecting while we’re eliminating fraud, waste and abuse.”

“These are reforms to ensure to restore and preserve the system so that it doesn’t collapse on itself,” Johnson continued. “That means ensuring illegal aliens don’t get coverage meant for Americans in need. It means implementing work requirements to ensure that adults who can work but refuse to cannot keep cheating the system”

House Republicans are proposing to expand Medicaid work requirements by mandating that able-bodied, childless adults aged 19 to 64 years-old prove they are working, seeking employment, volunteering or in school for at least 80 hours a month. GOP lawmakers’ proposal to tighten eligibility standards would save roughly $300 billion over seven years, according to a partial CBO estimate released by House Republicans.

The floated work requirements are not expected to kick in until 2029. Conservative lawmakers have criticized the implementation for being far too late.

Four Trump administration officials called on Congressional Republicans to impose new work requirements on Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), in a New York Times essay Wednesday.

House Energy and Commerce chairman Brett Guthrie defended work requirements and other Medicaid reforms Tuesday, calling them “common sense policies that will return taxpayer dollars to middle-class families.”

“Let me be clear – these work requirements would only apply to able-bodied adults without dependents who don’t have a disqualifying condition, encouraging them to re-enter the workforce and regain their independence,” Guthrie added.

Despite House Democrats blasting the Republicans’ proposal, work requirements are popular with a majority of Americans, per recent polling.

More than six in ten Americans, including 47% of Democrats, favor implementing work requirements that would require “nearly all adults” to be working or looking for work in order to be enrolled in the entitlement program, according to a February 2025 poll by KFF, a health policy research and polling firm.

Support for work requirements increased to 77% among all voters when participants were told that implementing the measure would allow health insurance from the entitlement program to be reserved for vulnerable groups, such as seniors, low-income children and Americans with disabilities, according to KFF.

About 7.6 million people are projected to go uninsured in 2034, including 1.4 million illegal immigrants, according to the CBO’s preliminary estimate on coverage changes resulting from House Republicans’ draft budget.

“President Trump and Republicans are protecting Medicaid — and that starts with kicking 1.4 million illegal immigrants off the program to prioritize the Americans who need it,” White House Spokesman Kush Desai told the DCNF Wednesday.

House Republicans have torched their Democratic colleagues for allegedly “fighting to protect Medicaid for able bodied adults who refuse to work.”

When asked by Republican Texas Rep. August Pfluger if Congress should institute any work requirements in order to qualify for Medicaid benefits, Democratic California Rep. Raul Ruiz unequivocally answered “no.”

“That’s an easy one,” Ruiz said.

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