Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-La.) reassured concerns on Sunday over a growing concern that President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” would cut Medicaid for Americans. Instead, he sounded the alarm that more than 1.4 million illegal immigrants are currently enrolled in Medicaid. Johnson’s remarks underscore what many conservatives have long warned: the unchecked flow of illegal aliens is not only a national security and sovereignty issue, but a massive burden on American taxpayers.
During an appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Johnson said there was a lot of misinformation circulating in the news about Trump’s spending package, doubling down on the fact that the GOP-backed bill is “not cutting Medicaid in this package.” Instead, he argued that the more than 1.4 million illegal immigrants who are enrolled in Medicaid have been improperly reaping the benefits of a program meant to serve vulnerable American citizens like pregnant women, single mothers, the elderly, and the disabled. Johnson said the efforts to eliminate fraud, waste, and abuse in the system are about protecting these resources for the Americans who genuinely need them.
“You‘re talking about 4.8 million able-bodied workers, young men, for example, who are on Medicaid and not working. They are choosing not to work when they can. That is called fraud. They are cheating the system,” Johnson added. “When you root out those kinds of abuses, you save the resources that are so desperately needed by the people who deserve it and need it most. That‘s what we‘re doing.”
Johnson’s remarks come as Dr. Mehmet Oz, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, revealed that hard-working American taxpayers have been footing a $14 billion bill for Medicaid fraud while eligible patients struggle for care.
“There's about $14 billion we've identified with DOGE, of folks who are duly enrolled wrongly in multiple states for Medicaid," Oz said. “You live in New Jersey, but you move to Pennsylvania, and which state gets your Medicaid? Turns out both states collect money from the federal government.”
Oz highlighted the absence of a federal work requirement for Medicaid, contrasting it with the SNAP (food stamps) program, which does include such a requirement. He argued that requiring able-bodied individuals to work is better for both the individuals and the country, and that failing to do so creates a moral hazard.
He also said that some states are financially rewarded for not fully cooperating with the federal government on Medicaid. Under the program’s expansion, the federal government covers up to 90 percent of costs in certain states, while others only get 50–60 percent, creating an imbalance that discourages full cooperation.
“People work their whole life, chipped into Medicare, they get the program, they retire thinking they have got a great system, and the hospital tells them, 'Listen, you guys don't pay as well as the able-bodied folks on Medicaid who haven't been able to get a job.' So, in a way, we value them more, and that's what ends up happening that disrupts the system,” Oz said.
