Kentucky lawmakers continue to scrutinize the cost of running Kentucky's Medicaid program.

One Republican says every person bumped off the Medicaid rolls is money saved.

Our June Leffler is monitoring the conversation in Frankfort about Medicaid.

And has more in this legislative update.

This year, Congress passed the big, beautiful bill, in part seeking to shrink Medicaid spending by mandating work or community engagement requirements.

Before Congress acted, Kentucky lawmakers had already passed similar requirements this year in House Bill 695.

Now, the state is waiting on federal guidance before implementing those new state standards.

Based on our initial 1115 application that we submitted to CMS, the centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, we anticipate that approximately 70,000 of those Medicaid expansion members will be subject to community engagement requirements.

The chair of a new state Medicaid Oversight committee says potentially 70,000 less Medicaid recipients could equal millions in savings.

If I look at the costs of that, it's around $971.

That equates about $68 million.

We we do have.

We know that 70,000 would be subject to community engagement if they requirements if they comply.

They would not be terminated from Medicaid.

So I think we would just needed some additional information and get some more experience to be able to to calculate that.

State Representative Ken Fleming also suggests people who make too much money to qualify for Medicaid are still getting the benefit.

I personally witnessed somebody going through a medicaid application and they plugged in $44,000, not a month, but a year, and they were qualified for Medicaid.

That that that calls me.

I very jaw dropping a situation of what I just saw a person making $44,000 a year would qualify for Medicaid if they support a family of four.

A Democratic lawmaker pushes back, saying individuals and families are not the ones committing Medicaid fraud.

I have been told that unequivocally that fraud in Medicare and Medicaid is on the part of providers, providers billing incorrectly, using wrong code, making up patients, making up diagnoses.

It is true that member fraud is much lower and, you know, in terms of if you're trying to compare it to provider fraud, it's almost nonexistent.

It's so small.

And the reason is because we have such aggressive, data sources that are used, we have so many, stringent processes and procedures related to making that determination that eligibility eligibility fraud is very, very rare.

Federal and state prosecutors pursue these Medicaid fraud cases.

Just yesterday, a Louisville doctor agreed to pay $250,000 to settle a false claims case for Kentucky addiction.

I'm June Leffler.

Thank you much, Joan.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, Kentucky spends $16 billion a year to cover Medicaid.

Though federal funds cover more than 80% of that cost.