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What to Watch

Medicaid: What to Watch in 2026

Medicaid: What to Watch in 2026

In this brief, KFF explores how state fiscal pressures are likely to converge with the implementation of the 2025 reconciliation law to affect Medicaid coverage, financing, and access to care over the next year, especially leading up to the midterm elections.

Work Requirements

Challenges with Implementing Work Requirements

Many states are anticipating a variety of implementation challenges, including the need for complex system changes, a compressed implementation timeline, and limited staff capacity.

What is the Medicaid Hardship Exception?

The number of Medicaid expansion enrollees who ultimately qualify for the high unemployment hardship exception will depend on how the exception is implemented and how unemployment rates changes.

Tracking Implementation of the 2025 Reconciliation Law: Medicaid Work Requirements

KFF’s interactive tracks key data and policies that will affect how states implement Medicaid work requirements, which are required under the 2025 budget reconciliation law starting in January 2027. The tracker includes state-level data on Medicaid enrollment and renewal outcomes as well as current state enrollment and renewal policies.

2025 Medicaid Home Care survey

Payment Rates Ahead of 2025 Reconciliation Law

This issue brief describes Medicaid payment rates for home care and other workforce supports that are in place in 2025, before the majority of the 2025 reconciliation law provisions start taking effect.

Home Care Support for Family Caregivers in 2025
number of responding states, including DC, that allow payments for family caregivers by type of home care program and type of caregiver.

This issue brief describes the availability of self-directed services and supports for family caregivers in Medicaid home care in 2025, before most provisions in the reconciliation law take effect.

States’ Management of Home Care Spending

This issue brief describes the mechanisms states are currently using to limit Medicaid spending on home care and their plans for adopting new mechanisms in state fiscal year (FY) 2026.

Waiting Lists for Medicaid Home Care, 2016 to 2025
A Look at Waiting Lists for Medicaid Home- and Community-Based Services from 2016 to 2025

This data note provides new information about waiting lists in Medicaid home care before many of the provisions in the 2025 reconciliation law go into effect.

Eligibility and coverage

  • Eligibility, Enrollment, and Renewal Policies

    KFF's survey findings capture state actions that seek to improve the accuracy and efficiency of Medicaid and CHIP enrollment and renewal processes, as of January 2025.

  • Seniors and People with Disabilities

    More than 1 in 3 people with disabilities (15 million) have Medicaid (35%). In comparison, only 19% of people without disabilities have Medicaid.

  • Children with Special Needs

    Amid debates about proposed cuts to federal Medicaid spending, this brief analyzes key characteristics of children with special health care needs and explores how Medicaid provides them with coverage.

  • People With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities

    Among the estimated 8 million people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD), over three million have Medicaid coverage.

  • Adults with Chronic Conditions

    Among working age adults enrolled in Medicaid, approximately three quarters have one or more chronic conditions, and nearly one-third have three or more.

The Essentials

  • 5 Facts: Immigrants and Medicaid

    This brief provides five key facts on Medicaid and immigrants as context for understanding the potential impacts of policy changes under the Trump administration.

  • 5 Facts: Medicaid and Hospitals

    This brief explains the role of Medicaid for hospitals, including how much spending on hospital care comes from Medicaid, the share of births covered by the program, and how Medicaid expansion has impacted hospital finances.

  • Medicaid Financing: The Basics

    Medicaid is a major source of financing for states to provide health coverage and long-term services and supports for low-income residents. This brief examines key questions about Medicaid financing and how it works.

  • 5 Facts: Medicaid’s Share of National Health Spending

    This brief explores how Medicaid spending contributes to national health spending and how different service areas contribute to Medicaid costs.

  • 5 Facts: Medicaid and Nursing Facilities

    The substantial Medicaid savings in the reconciliation bill could have major implications for nearly 15,000 federally certified nursing facilities and the 1.2 million people living in them.

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  • People With HIV in Non-Medicaid Expansion States: Who Could Gain Coverage Eligibility Through Build Back Better or Future Expansion?

    Issue Brief

    In this analysis, we explore the implications of the Build Back Better Act's current coverage provisions for people with HIV in select non-expansion states. We estimate the size of the population that could gain eligibility as well as their socio-demographic characteristics, examine their affordability barriers and assess the potential impact on the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program. We also explore what Medicaid expansion could mean in these non-expansion states for people with HIV.

  • States with Section 1115 ACA Expansion Waivers, December 2015

    Feature

    This slide shows the current status of state decisions to use Section 1115 waivers to expand Medicaid. A total of 31 states including DC have adopted the ACA Medicaid expansion, including 6 states with ACA 1115 ACA expansion waivers. AZ has a pending waiver application that seeks changes to its expansion. MT and NH’s waivers will take effect on 1/1/16. PA originally expanded through a waiver but subsequently transitioned to a state plan amendment. TN and UT have debated waiver proposals which have not been approved by their state legislatures or submitted to CMS.

  • A Guide to Understanding Medicaid Expansion Waivers as States Debate What to Do Under the ACA

    News Release

    With the recent governors’ elections in Kentucky and Louisiana refocusing attention on state Medicaid expansion decisions, a newly updated issue brief from the Kaiser Family Foundation provides an overview of the waivers obtained by six states – Arkansas, Iowa, Michigan, Indiana, New Hampshire and Montana -- that are pursuing alternative Medicaid expansions under the Affordable Care Act.

  • Takeaways From Alaska’s Medicaid Expansion

    News Release

    In his latest column for The Wall Street Journal’s Think Tank, Drew Altman discusses the implications of the governor of Alaska’s decision to move ahead unilaterally with Medicaid expansion. All previous columns by Drew Altman are available.

  • 5 Ways the Graham-Cassidy Proposal Puts Medicaid Coverage At Risk

    Fact Sheet

    The Graham-Cassidy proposal to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is reviving the federal health reform debate and could come up for a vote in the Senate before the budget reconciliation authority expires on September 30. This fact sheet describes five ways in which the proposal revamps and cuts Medicaid, redistributes federal funds across states and eliminates coverage for millions of poor Americans.

  • Don’t Expect Medicaid Work Requirements to Make a Big Difference

    From Drew Altman

    Under the Trump Administration, some Republican governors may look to move their Medicaid programs in a more conservative direction. In his latest column for Axios, Drew Altman discusses the arguments about Medicaid “work requirements” and why few people are likely to be affected by them in practice.

  • Medicaid Family Planning Programs: Case Studies of Six States After ACA Implementation

    Report

    In light of the coverage trends and other ACA-related changes, this paper describes the impact on women and their partners, as well as family planning providers, of the impact of family planning expansion programs under Medicaid. It is based largely on interviews with state officials, providers and consumer advocates in Alabama, California, Connecticut, Illinois, Missouri and Virginia – a cross-section of states in terms of geography, Medicaid expansion status, and implementation of a Medicaid family planning program. State interviews were supplemented by interviews with national experts, policymakers and family planning provider organizations. This study was conducted in Summer 2016 before the Presidential election.