(Office of the CNMI Congressional Delegate) — U.S. Congressman Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan announced Sunday a bipartisan agreement to provide the CNMI with $480 million in federal Medicaid funding over the next eight years. The local match will be 17 percent, lower than any state government. Sablan said legislation to enact the deal is planned for introduction early next week; and he will be an original cosponsor of the bill.
“I want to thank Frank Pallone, Jr., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Cathy McMorris Rodgers, ranking member of the committee, who worked with members on their respective sides of the aisle to reach this agreement,” Congressman Sablan said.
In a joint statement Pallone and McMorris Rodgers said the bipartisan deal “will avert the looming fiscal cliff by providing Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and American Samoa with stable Medicaid funding for years to come.”
They said once introduced the bill would immediately be marked up by the Health Subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee in preparation for a vote by the full House of Representatives.
The bipartisan agreement extends the increased funding and improved federal/local matching rates of 83 and 17 percent that Sablan worked to enact in 2019. That two-year deal will now continue for another eight years for the Northern Marianas and American Samoa, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Puerto Rico will receive a five year extension with a federal/local match of 76/24.
