Wisconsin GOP Rep. Weirdly Lies About Helping His State Survive The Medicaid Cuts For his State He Voted For
WASHINGTON – Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) is peddling a bizarre claim that he was key to securing $1 billion to help hospitals in his state survive the sweeping Medicaid cuts in President Donald Trump’s tax bill.
Except that he wasn’t — and he voted
for Trump’s bill.
In more than a dozen social media posts in recent days, Van Orden tries to take credit for Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers (D) and state legislators rushing to pass a budget that increases the state’s so-called Medicaid provider tax rate. This is a state-imposed tax on health care providers, like hospitals, which the state uses to help pay for its Medicaid program. The federal government matches the state’s provider tax rate.
Until recently, Wisconsin had a very low provider tax rate compared to other states. Because Trump’s tax bill would have frozen that tax rate at its low level, state legislators rushed to increase the rate in their budget so Wisconsin could be grandfathered into Trump’s tax law at the maximum level, meaning it will now get an extra $1 billion in federal money every year.
Van Orden, whose House seat is rated
a “toss-up” in the 2026 elections, seems to want people to believe he was vital to his state getting this $1 billion to offset the pain of the bill he voted for. In Wisconsin alone, Trump’s now-law is estimated to kick
more than 258,000 people off of their health insurance and puts at least
three rural hospitals at risk of closing.
In
a Friday post, Van Orden complained that a PBS story about Wisconsin state legislators racing to pass their budget to secure the extra federal funding “failed to mention that we worked seamlessly with the State Gov to get this done.”
That
same day, he accused Evers of telling “a flat out lie” about Republicans in Congress selling out families to pay for tax cuts for the rich in Trump’s bill: “We just got $1,000,000,000 annually for BadgerCare,” Van Orden claimed, referring to the state’s Medicaid program.
He
repeatedlytook credit for the $1 billion in a
daylongspat with Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), who accused Van Orden
of lying about the damaging effects of Trump’s tax bill. He did it again on Sunday, in response to a social media post by Evers touting that the state’s budget “ensures access to healthcare.”
“This is because of State and Congressional Republicans,” Van Orden
tweeted at Evers. “You know it. I told you.”
Throughout his posts, Van Orden keeps sharing
a copy of a letter he sent to Evers on July 2 in which he essentially pleads with the governor to hurry up and pass the state budget to protect Wisconsin hospitals from the Medicaid cuts in the tax bill he voted for. He claims this letter is proof that he is the reason the governor and state legislature took fast action.
But Evers’ spokesperson told HuffPost on Tuesday that Van Orden played no role in the monthslong negotiations between the governor and state legislators on their budget, or on their efforts to move quickly to secure the extra $1 billion to offset Medicaid cuts.
“Congressman Van Orden never personally advocated to the governor or our office for the hospital assessment provision to be included in the state budget until after it was clearly already part of the state budget, he had nothing to do with the hospital assessment being part of bipartisan state budget negotiations with Republican leaders, and he had nothing to do with the fact that the governor decided to enact the state budget before the federal reconciliation bill was signed,” Evers’ spokesperson Britt Cudaback said in a statement.
If Congressman Van Orden wanted to take credit for supporting Medicaid and protecting Wisconsinites’ access to healthcare, perhaps he shouldn’t have voted to gut Medicaid and kick 250,000 Wisconsinites off their healthcare.Britt Cudaback, spokesperson for Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers (D)
The governor worked with Democrats in Wisconsin’s congressional delegation for months to monitor potential federal changes to hospital payments under Trump’s bill, added Cudaback. But Van Orden didn’t reach out to Evers’ office until June 30, after Evers and Republican state leaders had already reached a bipartisan state budget agreement.
“It was only then that Congressman Van Orden reached out to tell the governor and our office something we already knew and had long planned for, which is that the state budget would need to be enacted before President Trump signed the federal reconciliation bill,” she said.
Cudaback took a shot at the GOP lawmaker for, she said, pretending to care about protecting people’s health care after voting to kick so many people off of it.
“Put simply, if Congressman Van Orden wanted to take credit for supporting Medicaid and protecting Wisconsinites’ access to healthcare, perhaps he shouldn’t have voted to gut Medicaid and kick 250,000 Wisconsinites off their healthcare,” she said.
Cudaback later
called Van Orden out directly on social media, too. “Not true,” she wrote in response to a post by Van Orden claiming Evers had secured the $1 billion “because I told him if he did not get it done, we would miss the once in a generation opportunity.”
In a brief statement, Van Orden told HuffPost that it’s clear he was key to the Wisconsin governor and state legislature moving quickly to pass their budget because of the time Evers signed it into law.
“The only reason Tony signed the bill at 1:30 in the morning was to make the deadline I spoke and wrote to him about,” he said Tuesday. “Period. Do that math.”
Pocan was still mocking Van Orden on Monday for trying to take credit for passing a state budget bill.
“I didn’t realize he was serving in the State Legislature and Congress simultaneously,” the Wisconsin Democrat said in a statement. “The State Legislature voted to expand Medicaid’s reimbursements to the states before Derrick, Congressional Republicans, and Trump could force through their devastating reconciliation bill that will cut $1 trillion from healthcare nationwide and could shutter rural hospitals across the state.”
“You can’t create a problem and then claim credit for someone else’s help in making it slightly less horrific,” Pocan added. “He and his Republican colleagues are the reason this legislative fix was so necessary in the first place.”
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