Tony, an energetic 7-year-old who loves playing football and roughhousing with his brothers wasn\u2019t all that excited when his parents took the family to see Santa in December. Instead, he was tired and lethargic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His parents were surprised because Tony would usually be bouncing off the walls at the prospect of seeing Santa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tony had been feeling under the weather for a few weeks, and his pediatrician diagnosed him with a virus and bronchitis. But after the visit to Santa near their home in Wesley Chapel, Florida, Pauline McLaurin says, her mother\u2019s intuition told it was something more serious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She took her son directly to the emergency room, and her gut instinct was right: Tony had leukemia. From there, things got worse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tony has been in and out of the hospital, his body weakened by chemotherapy. Pauline McLaurin quit her job as a fifth-grade teacher to care for him, and they struggle to pay their bills on the salary her husband, Ronnie McLaurin, makes as an electrician.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As if that weren\u2019t enough, the McLaurins have a new worry. They lost their private insurance when Pauline McLaurin left her job, and now they fear losing their Medicaid, the government health insurance program that pays for Tony\u2019s care.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Medicaid insures 1 out of 3 children diagnosed with cancer<\/a> in the United States, according to the American Cancer Society\u2019s Cancer Action Network.<\/p>\n\n\n\n President Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers have called for dramatic\u00a0government budget cuts<\/a>\u00a0that many nonpartisan experts say are unfeasible without significant cuts to Medicaid.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n A House Republican budget plan instructs the Energy and Commerce Committee, which oversees Medicaid, to identify at least $880 billion in mandatory spending cuts over the next 10 years<\/a>. While the plan doesn\u2019t specifically mention Medicaid, the experts say it would be unfeasible for Republicans to hit that target without significant cuts to the health program, since it\u2019s one of the largest sources of federal spending, costing more than $600 billion<\/a> per year, according to government data<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Pauline McLaurin said she is \u201cterrified\u201d and \u201chopeless\u201d at the prospect of losing Medicaid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s a very scary, uneasy feeling,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The McLaurins are not alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mary Ann Massolio runs 1Voice Academy, a school for children with cancer, which Tony attends. She says over the past few months, many parents have expressed distress about possibly losing Medicaid. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s anxiety on steroids,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In February, the American Academy of Pediatrics<\/a> and other groups wrote a letter to lawmakers expressing their \u201cgrave concerns\u201d about potential Medicaid cuts and \u201cthe devastating consequences for millions of children across the country.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n If these Republican budget cuts go through, some children with cancer could die, said Dr. Sharon Castellino, who studies Medicaid as a pediatric oncologist at the Aflac Cancer and Blood Disorders Center of Children\u2019s Healthcare of Atlanta, and a professor of pediatrics at the Emory University School of Medicine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is a bipartisan issue,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019re incredibly worried.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n As of November 2024, Medicaid covers more than 70 million people in the U.S., according to the federal government\u2019s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services<\/a>. It\u2019s the largest single source of health coverage in the U.S., covering nearly half of all children and more than 40% of births, according to the American Hospital Association.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n A 2024 study, conducted by Emory’s Castellino and other researchers found that children who experienced interruptions in Medicaid coverage<\/a> before or during their cancer diagnosis and treatment were less likely to survive the disease, compared to those with continuous coverage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Republicans say budget cuts can be made without hurting Medicaid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMedicare, Medicaid, none of that stuff is going to be touched,\u201d Trump<\/a> said in February.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe president has said repeatedly, we\u2019re not going to hurt Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid recipients who are eligible for it. And that is our guiding north, our true north,\u201d House Speaker Mike Johnson<\/a>, R-La., told Punchbowl News last month. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In his rural Louisiana district, nearly 25% of adults under age 65 rely on Medicaid, according to an NBC News analysis<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI understand this acutely \u2014 it directly affects my people. We\u2019re going to be very careful not to cut a benefit for anyone who is eligible to receive it and relies upon it,\u201d Johnson told Punchbowl.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But<\/a> last month<\/a>, the Congressional Budget Office, which is nonpartisan, said House Republicans can\u2019t meet their budget target without making significant cuts to Medicaid or Medicare, the nation\u2019s health insurance program for seniors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the House, the Medicaid budget falls under the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and the Republican budget plan instructs that committee to cut spending<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In February, Johnson said that \u201cwe\u2019re going to cut the fraud, waste and abuse and that\u2019s where we\u2019re going to get the savings to accomplish this mission.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It would be very difficult to make the proposed Republican cuts just by targeting fraud, waste and abuse, said Megan Cole Brahim, an associate professor at the Boston University School of Public Health and co-director of the school\u2019s Medicaid Policy Lab.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis on the surface seems like a reasonable idea \u2014 nobody likes fraud, waste or abuse,\u201d she said. \u201cBut there is a misalignment between the proposed cuts the Republicans are trying to make [and] the actual scope of fraud and waste.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Johnson identified another way he intends to save Medicaid dollars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou\u2019ve got a lot of able-bodied workers, young men who could be out working, who are choosing not to because they\u2019re on the government wagon,\u201d he told Punchbowl. \u201cI think that\u2019s wrong, and I think if you get those people out of the program \u2014 and there\u2019s a large number of them \u2014 then you preserve it for the people who actually need it and deserve it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cole Brahim called this a \u201cfalse narrative,\u201d pointing to a KFF study<\/a> that shows in 2023, nearly two-thirds of adults ages 19-64 covered by Medicaid were working and nearly 3 in 10 were not working because of caregiving responsibilities, illness or disability, or school attendance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the McLaurins\u2019 case, Ronnie McLaurin doesn\u2019t have health insurance through his work as a self-employed electrician.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n At this point, the Republican budget proposals are just that \u2014 proposals. The House and the Senate each have their own plans, and nothing has been written into law yet. The House Energy and Commerce Committee<\/a> could meet as early as the week of May 5 to identify the spending cuts that could slash into Medicaid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s why Massolio at the 1Voice Foundation \u2014 the group that runs the school Tony attends in Florida \u2014 joined a trip to Capitol Hill earlier this year with other advocates to urge lawmakers to keep Medicaid intact. <\/p>\n\n\n\n She says one of her big fears is that even if Medicaid funds for hospital services and doctor visits remain stable, other critical support services might be slashed, such as transportation to doctor’s appointments<\/a> or in-home nursing visits<\/a> for very sick children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On her trip to Washington, one of Massolio\u2019s first stops was the office of Rep. Kathy Castor, D-Fla., a familiar face. Massolio\u2019s 9-year-old son, Jay, died from lymphoma in 1997, and she\u2019s often turned to Castor, who is co-chair of the congressional Childhood Cancer Caucus, for help advancing legislation to support children with cancer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Castor\u2019s message to the group was to keep fighting. She reminded them that in Trump\u2019s first term, he vowed to eliminate the Affordable Care Act \u2014 also known as Obamacare \u2014 but in the end, after widespread public opposition, it didn\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n