Governor Newsom Backs Down

Floor Speech

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Mr. KILEY of California. Mr. Speaker, yesterday California Governor Gavin Newsom finally backed down from his irresponsible, reckless policy of providing full-scope Medicaid, Medi-Cal coverage to every person who is income eligible in our State illegally. Of course, the Governor did not do the right thing on his own but only in response to the pressure that we have brought to bear.

It has been painfully obvious that this policy, which no other State in the country has, was utterly unsustainable and was threatening the solvency of Medicaid in California itself. The cost has ballooned for this year to $10 billion, over three times what was initially estimated. The Governor has had to take out an emergency loan and then separately go to the legislature in the middle of the year for a bailout.

The Governor has finally acknowledged this, that the policy should never have been enacted, and he has said he is going to freeze any new enrollment by adults who are in our country illegally.

However, the Governor is only partially reversing his policy. Indeed, by the time this freeze goes into effect, we will have already spent $23 billion that could have gone toward improving access to care for legal California residents.

The partial repeal is not a solution. For one thing, it will continue to cost us enormous sums in State tax dollars. For another, it could lead to the loss of billions and billions of dollars every year in Federal funding.

As I called on the Governor before to repeal this policy, as I have introduced legislation requiring him to do so, I am now calling on Governor Newsom not to go halfway but to completely reverse this reckless, disastrous policy that no other State in the country has. Absolute Definition of Insanity

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Mr. KILEY of California. Mr. Speaker, yesterday Governor Newsom introduced his budget proposal in Sacramento and has decided to double State funding for high-speed rail. This is the absolute definition of insanity. It has been some 16 years, 17 years since the project was approved. They have spent $17 billion, and there has not been a single passenger.

Even under the most wildly optimistic scenarios, we are going to have a line from Palmdale to Gilroy in 20 years that will require 2 hours of additional travel on each end to get from San Francisco to L.A. In 20 years, riders will be able to get from San Francisco to L.A. in 6 hours, something you can do on a plane in 1 hour today.

This project has been called a project that won't even be built within the next century by even sources like The New York Times. I have introduced legislation to eliminate all future Federal funding for high-speed rail. The Governor continues to believe that Federal funding will come. It is not going to come. There is currently an investigation by the Department of Transportation as well, and I have asked for an investigation by FBI Director Kash Patel to look into exactly where all of this money went.

It is time to end this irresponsible failure of a project--the biggest public infrastructure failure in U.S. history--once and for all and put our transportation dollars where they are needed: toward improving our roads, repairing potholes, alleviating traffic, on things that will actually benefit the quality of life for Californians.

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