Baldwin Enlists Constituents In Fight to Save Medicaid

(Left to right) County Executive David Crowley, U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, George Banda, Milwaukee County Aging Commission Director Jan Wilberg at Washington Park Senior Center. Photo taken Feb. 24, 2026 by Graham Kilmer.

U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D) visited Milwaukee Monday morning to stoke public opposition against impending cuts to Medicaid.

Baldwin held a round table with Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley and the Milwaukee County Commission on Aging discussing the Republican plan to make deep cuts to Medicaid — the federal health insurance program for low-income families and seniors and persons with disabilities — in part to offset an extension of the 2017 tax cuts primarily benefitting corporations and the wealthiest individuals in the country.

“I am fighting against such cuts from ever occurring,” Baldwin told media gathered at the event. “Part of how you do that is in the courts; part of how you do that is in Congress; part of how you do that is working with constituents to uplift their stories, and that’s in no small part what we’re doing this morning.”

Congressional Republicans are advancing budget resolutions in both the House of Representatives and the Senate that cut billions in federal funding for Medicaid. The House resolution rolls the spending cuts and an extension of the tax breaks implemented during President Donald Trump‘s first term into the same bill. President Trump is backing the House version, which he said implements his full legislative agenda in “ONE BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL.”

Baldwin also called Trump out for flip-flopping on Medicaid cuts in less than 24 hours. The president told Fox News Medicaid would not be touched and then endorsed the House bill proposing cuts to the program the next morning.

In 2024, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated extending the tax cuts would cost more than $4.6 trillion over 10 years. The House bill proposes an additional $900 billion in tax breaks on top of that extension, which would be offset by more than $800 billion in cuts to Medicaid, according to budget analysis by the progressive Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

“Republicans want to find room in the budget for massive tax breaks for billionaires like Elon Musk and President Trump, like the ultra wealthy and major corporations,” said Baldwin, who also pushed back on suggestion that cuts were targeting waste, fraud and abuse, the catchall explanation for the cuts Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is making across the government.

“Everybody wants to see an efficient government. Everyone wants to see us go after fraud, after waste, after abuse, but the cuts that we’re talking about, the depth of the cuts we’re talking about in the Medicaid program, nearly a trillion dollars, that is far deeper,” Baldwin said.

The senator’s visit came on the heels of a marathon session in the U.S. Senate, called a Vote-A-Rama, considering the Senate budget resolution, which splits the spending cuts and tax breaks into two separate bills, unlike the House resolution. During the session, Baldwin and her Democratic colleagues failed to convince enough Republicans (four are needed) to break with their party and support amendments blocking cuts to Medicaid.

The senator is not without hope that her colleagues, and constituents, can change that between now and budget reconciliation, which is a federal budget process that allows Congress to sidestep the senate filibuster.

“Pressure led to three Republicans in the first Trump administration joining with all the Democrats to save the Affordable Care Act,” Baldwin said. They were Senators Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins and the late John McCain.

“Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski are still there,” Baldwin said. “We need two more.”

Baldwin’s personal experience with Medicaid began when she was a child and her mother’s wages as a personal attendant for a man with cerebral palsy were paid by Medicaid, she said. Later, when her mother needed nursing care at the end of her own life it was paid for in part through Medicaid.

“Her life would have been so different if she didn’t have care in her final years,” Baldwin said. “That’s what this means. It’s not numbers, it’s people.”

Those sort of personal stories are what the senator encouraged members of the county’s aging commission to share with her and with her colleagues in the House and the Senate.

George Banda, a Vietnam veteran, said his brother is on Medicaid, in “ill-health” and “extremely worried about these cuts.” Crocker Stephenson, a former journalist with the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, said his sister uses Medicaid and dehumanizing language currently surrounding the program has caused her shame and embarrassment. Brian Peters, who works with Independence First, said his organization has fielded “many calls” from individuals worried about losing access to the in-home care or home modifications that allow them to live independently.

Sharing personal stories can break down the stigma around Medicaid and encourage others to publicly share their experience with the program, said County Executive Crowley, whose late mother was a Medicaid recipient. “And so we need to make sure that these cases are out there to help encourage others and give them the courage that they need to tell their stories,” he said.

It’s that sort of personal storytelling, and advocacy, Baldwin said, “that we can use to fight back.”