Medicaid advocates--

Thank you to so many people for joining this afternoon's call.  A number of people were not able to join, so detailed notes are attached.  Below are the high points and some promised resources:

*  McConnell is planning to bring a healthcare bill to the floor early next week.  It could be the revised Better Care Reconciliation Act (the repeal and place bill with the Medicaid caps leading to $756 billion in Medicaid cuts and 22 million people losing insurance) or it could be the Obamacare Repeal Reconciliation Act (the repeal without a replace bill -- with 32 million people losing insurance, a cliff for the Medicaid expansion, roll back of pre-existing condition protections and cuts to the community first choice program).  Bottom line, any of these bills are very harmful for people with disabilities [For more information about both bills and links to the CBO, you can go to www.protectourmedicaid.org] At the end of this email is a good visual comparing all the bills.

*  We need to advocate strongly with Senators to oppose bringing any of the bills to the floor and to oppose the substance of the bills.  We need to push Senators to not only oppose the bill, but to vote no on a motion to proceed.  For those Senators that have said or indicated that they are a no (Senators Collins, Murkowski, Capito) we need to thank them.  We need to keep the pressure on Portman and Heller, and also keep chipping away at senators in Indiana, Louisiana, Colorado, and Pennsylvania.

*  Keep up the advocacy.  Keep calling, writing, tweeting, visiting offices, and joining rallies.  Please show up for the NCIL march and rally in DC on July 25th.  FB event is here:   https://www.facebook.com/events/151689618722673/ and online description here: https://medicaid.publicrep.org/events/march-for-disability-rights/.  There is a national call-in day tomorrow, info here:  https://medicaid.publicrep.org/events/familiesusa-national-call-in-day-to-save-health-care/  We are also keeping track of events, call-in days, etc. here (and regularly updating):  https://medicaid.publicrep.org/feature/events/.  

*  Additional resources mentioned on the call:

1.  CBPP blog about how any additional funds that McConnell might add to address concerns of expansion states with the BCRA is not enough:  https://www.cbpp.org/blog/200-billion-more-wont-fix-unfixable-senate-health-bill

2.  JAMA article about bi-partisan fixes to Medicaid:  https://newsatjama.jama.com/2017/07/11/jama-forum-reforming-medicaid/

3.  July 18 bi-partisan governor's letter:  https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/as-obamacare-repeal-sputters-sandoval-and-10-other-governors-urge-senate-to-abandon-effort

Bottom line, our advocacy has been working, and we need to keep it up. Thank you for all you are doing! We'll try to keep everyone updated -- things seem to be changing every moment.

The CCD Grassroots Team

Alison Barkoff, Center for Public Representation, xxxxxx@cpr-ma.org

Christine Grosso, Association of University Centers on Disability, xxxxxx@aucd.org

Nicole Jorwic, The Arc of the United States, xxxxxx@thearc.org

Vania Leveille, American Civil Liberties Union, xxxxxx@aclu.org