Arizona’s Brewer Seeks to Cut 280,000 From Medicaid

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer asked for U.S. permission to tighten Medicaid eligibility to drop coverage for 280,000 people and slash $541.5 million in spending, a move other states may follow.

The 16th-largest state by population faces a $1.2 billion deficit in the coming fiscal year, more than 80 percent of which is from Medicaid costs, Brewer wrote in a letter to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius yesterday.