Judge blocks work requirements for Medicaid in Arkansas and Kentucky

Guardian -A federal judge has ruled that Medicaid work requirements undermine the program’s mission of providing healthcare for the needy, dealing a blow to the Trump administration.

The US district judge James E Boasberg in Washington DC blocked work requirements for low-income people in two states, Arkansas and Kentucky, on Wednesday. He found that the states’ requirements pose numerous obstacles to getting healthcare that have gone unresolved by federal and state officials.

Boasberg sent the federal health and human services department back to the drawing board. But he stopped short of deciding the central question of whether work requirements are incompatible with Medicaid, a federal-state program that traditionally allows states broad leeway to set benefits and eligibility.