AUSTIN, Texas — Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan is prioritizing a package of bipartisan bills that would expand access to health care across Texas. The 10 bills include expanding telehealth, increasing broadband access to help with telehealth, making it easier for children to access Medicaid, expanding Medicaid to cover mothers for a year after they give birth and expanding who can administer vaccines in Texas.
Capital Tonight's Karina Kling spoke one-on-one with Phelan Wednesday about the legislation, why Medicaid expansion isn't included and his take on the voting bills advancing in the Texas legislature. Click the video link above to watch the full conversation. The following has been edited down slightly.
Q: How do you pay for the health care plan being prioritized in the House?
Phelan: "How we pay for these. There's opportunities within the budget for many of these items. The biggest item is HB18, dealing with a prescription drug rebate program. And we have opportunities, I feel, through this third round of CARES Act money to help fund that. It could be several hundred million dollars in that account and that account consistently replenishes itself...and at the end of the year that money is paid back into the fund."
Q: Why isn't Medicaid expansion part of this health care package?
Phelan: "That is a very targeted approach. That population is about 20 percent of the uninsured right now. So 1 in 5 uninsured would be eligible for Medicaid. What we rolled out today applies to all Texans. I think upwards of 29 million Texans can benefit in some form or fashion from the bills laid out today. I think the Medicaid expansion bill is a separate topic that has to be taken up by the full House in some form or fashion. I fully expect to have a vote on the House floor...But it's also part of that third CARES Act and there's a lot of fine print that comes with federal dollars. The House wants to make certain however we spend that money that it's done in a very responsible manner..."
Q: Would you vote for Medicaid expansion right now?
Phelan: "I haven't looked at the bill. I haven't seen the guardrails. I don't vote on bills. I really don't. I do think we need to do what we can for all Texans, those that are eligible and not eligible for Medicaid. So, the bill that's laid out right now, I'd have to take a long hard look at it and see what it did, make sure it's revenue-neutral moving forward..."
ON VOTING BILLS — HB6 and SB7
Q: Do you think changes are needed to these bills?
Phelan: "I think what we saw last election cycle were certain areas of the state creating election law out of thin air and there were irregularities. Certain counties were treating their election process much differently than a county right next door and that has to end. The election law are made here in the Texas Capitol, by members of the House and Senate, not by local elected officials and we need to rein that in. I think these corporations speaking out, they need to call me. Or I can call them, I have some of their phone numbers. I want to go line by line. I want to see where they see suppression in House Bill 6. I want them to point that out to me."
Q: Are you concerned about the growing corporate backlash and what that could mean for companies leaving the state?
Phelan: "I think they need to read House Bill 6. They need to work with the House on this legislation. I think this is getting caught up in a national narrative that is not respective of the work we've done here in the Texas House..."