Starting October 1, thousands of immigrants who are legally present in the United States are losing their Medicaid coverage due to the Republican budget bill enacted last year. The policy shift, part of H.R. 1 known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, has drawn sharp criticism from experts and advocates who warn of severe consequences for vulnerable populations.
Mustafa Rfat, a University of Nebraska at Omaha professor of social work whose research focuses on refugees with disabilities, reported receiving urgent calls recently from individuals terrified by the loss of healthcare access. “I spent these past two weeks just talking with so many of them, literally just terrorized by the reality that their children with disabilities are losing coverage,” Rfat said. He described one father, a refugee with disabilities raising two children who also have disabilities, who is now struggling to understand how he can procure necessary medications for his family.
Rfat is uniquely positioned to comment on the crisis, as he arrived in the U.S. from Iraq in 2011 as a refugee. At the time, he was suffering from a severe chronic spinal condition that left him unable to walk and in constant pain. After missing medications for an extended period and lacking medical attention, he relied on Medicaid as a critical resource while navigating the challenges of learning English, processing war trauma, and finding housing across several states.
“I was determined and in this determination, Medicaid was the big factor that made my dreams come true,” Rfat recalled. He noted that one of his specialists even wrote his first reference letter for college applications. Today, Rfat is a U.S. citizen with a doctorate and a teaching position, but he observes that refugees are now among the groups stripped of that same lifeline.
Under previous regulations, only a limited segment of legal immigrants, including refugees and asylum seekers, qualified for Medicaid. However, changes to the “Alien Medicaid Eligibility” provisions within the new act have narrowed eligibility further. According to estimates, approximately 280,000 people will lose coverage as a result of these legislative changes.
A professor who once depended on this exact program is now watching it vanish. The irony is staggering and genuinely heartbreaking for those affected.
Wait, does this apply to all legal immigrants or just specific categories? I’m trying to understand the scope before sharing this.
My father was a refugee who relied on Medicaid to get his prosthetic. This feels like a direct attack on people who already overcame so much.