- Medicaid portals in all 50 states experienced an outage Tuesday.
- Ingham County Health Department says that they are actively monitoring the situation.
- Video shows one neighbor who is wondering if the Medicaid portal shutdown has any relation to President Trump's executive order.
(The following is a transcription of the full broadcast story)
According to state officials, Medicaid portals were down Tuesday after President Trump announced a pause on federal grants, loans, and other financial assistance.
"I'm retired from the medical field," said neighbor Linda Houghson.
Houghson says that after retiring from her lifelong career, she stayed on her husband's insurance.
"Up to this February when he urgently lost his job."
When that happened, Houghson and her husband turned to the only insurance they could get.
"Fifteen phone calls and four months later, I finally had Medicaid."
Fast forward a few more months to Tuesday, Houghson noticed Medicaid portals were down while scrolling on her phone.
"What does that look like? What does that mean?"
Her questions stemmed from President Trump's executive order freezing federal funds. The White House Press Secretary addressed the issue Tuesday afternoon:
"Assistance that is going to direct individuals will not be impacted by this pause."
Still, Houghson is left wondering why this happened and what’s next.
"It's one of those things that we will have to wait and see," she said.
I reached out to the Ingham County Health Department, and they provided a statement acknowledging the uncertainty many residents feel.
They stated: "We want to reassure our community that we are actively monitoring the situation and working to understand the full scope of these potential budget changes. We remain fully committed to providing high-quality healthcare to the residents of Ingham County. Our focus will remain on planning for the future to ensure that essential services and care continue to be available to everyone who relies on us."
For now, Houghson says she’s relying on faith and hoping Medicaid portals will soon be back up and running.
"I always go with faith over fear," said Houghson.
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