Kentucky’s previous governor, Democrat Steve Beshear, has launched a statewide petition drive aimed at saving KYNECT, the state exchange implemented during his term, along with the state’s adoption of Medicaid Expansion. Both have been targeted by his successor, Republican Gov. Matt Bevin.
In speeches and a “Save Kentucky Healthcare” website that hosts a petition drive, Beshear says more than half a million residents have benefitted from the exchange and expansion in Kentucky, the only Southern state to adopt both of the measures enabled by the Affordable Care Act.
Kentucky’s Medicaid expansion was adopted through an executive order issued by Beshear. It can thus be reversed by a contrary order by Gov. Bevin, who campaigned on a platform of scaling back on the expansion and closing the exchange.
Bevin has said his goal is to shut down the exchange by November, with the state’s residents being directed instead to the federal Healthcare.gov platform. He believes the exchange is financially unsustainable, and that it is redundant to the federal site.
He has also stated that he will apply to the federal government to “restructure” the Medicaid expansion by 2017.
About 85,000 have used the Kynect platform to obtain health insurance plans. An additional 435,000 Kentuckians have received coverage through the state’s Medicaid expansion.
Beshear’s website positions his effort as a broad defense of the ACA: “If critics of the Affordable Care Act can turn back the clock in Kentucky, the state with the most successful health insurance expansion in the nation, they can do it almost anywhere. We must not allow that to happen.”
The online petition, hosted by Change.org, has gathered about 10,250 supporters in three weeks.
