Gov. Gavin Newsom shot back Wednesday at news that the Trump administration is stopping more than $1 billion in federal Medicaid payments to California and Minnesota over suspected fraud.
“Why they’re doing it is pure politics,” the Democratic governor said. “You know that, everybody knows it.”
He claimed the Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. under Republican President Donald Trump doesn’t have concrete proof of Medicaid fraud. He referenced letter exchanges with the administration where he said California was requested information they already provided.
“We take fraud seriously,” he added.
“What’s the point of the theater?” Newsom said.
The governor then claimed all this is an attack on his likely successor Xavier Becerra, the Democratic candidate for governor and a former Health and Human Services chief under former President Joe Biden.
Newsom then said that California is committed to stamping out fraud: “We don’t politicize it like these guys,” he claimed.
And he added that in a spirit of collaboration, his administration has been providing information and “have been.”
Kennedy earlier on Tuesday said if Newsom and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) want the money to fund low-income healthcare, “they need to provide documentation that these payments are legitimate.”
The health secretary criticized the Biden administration’s oversight of Medicaid, arguing that Becerra under Biden “looked the other way while fraud, waste, and abuse exploded.”
“The scammers got paid,” Kennedy said. “The taxpayers got stuck with these enormous bills.”
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is deferring over $200 million and over $867 million in federal Medicaid payments for Minnesota and California, respectively. The hold will be in place while federal officers review “high-risk Medicaid claims” and document deficiencies.
CMS officials suspect the questionable spending in California is rooted in in-home services. Over the past two federal fiscal years, California’s spending in these programs went up 24%, while the rest of the country’s average was 12%, according to CMS administrator Mehmet Oz.
