After the NFIB decision in June, Maine tried to expand Justice Roberts’ remedy to also make the “maintenance of effort” provision optional for states. Maine was unsuccessful in the First Circuit with the argument, for procedural reasons. Prior TIE coverage here.
The Obama Administration is sticking to the letter of the law, and announced yesterday that it is refusing to allow cuts for Medicaid beneficiaries at or below 133% (138% after the 5% income disregard) of FPL in Maine.
Maine has not yet announced whether it will take the case back to the First Circuit. With Huberfeld & Leonard, I’ve argued at length (see esp. pp. 75-83) that Maine does not have the winning argument, in an article to be published in the BU Law Review later this month. Advance copies here (SSRN is free, but may require registration). The short version is that MOE is a common tool to lock-in states during transition to a new program, was discussed in the briefing, but was not part of the coercion analysis in Justice Roberts’ plurality. The key provision was 42 USC 1396c, the Secretary’s authority to reduce some or all of the funding to non-compliant states. But we will see if Maine wants to argue the substance of this point at the First Circuit.
@koutterson
