A Lesson in Logic (Editorial)

Cecile Bledsoe

State Sen. Cecile Bledsoe needs to consider the consequences of her actions from several angles: practical, political and personal.

The Rogers Republican voted against funding the “private option” in the 2013 and 2014 legislative sessions, but she changed her mind last year and voted for reauthorizing funding in the 2015 session.

Gov. Asa Hutchinson has proposed amending the private option, the program that uses federal Medicaid money to buy private health insurance for poor Arkansans. Hutchinson’s changes would encourage recipients to work and would emphasize personal responsibility, and he’d rename the amended Medicaid expansion “Arkansas Works.”

But Bledsoe told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette last week that she won’t vote to fund the program, whatever its new name. “I am a definite no,” she said.

Which is a problem. It’s a problem because Hutchinson is going to need every vote supporting Medicaid expansion funding that he can get. And it’s a problem because Hutchinson’s proposed $5.33 billion budget depends on the influx of federal money that comes with Medicaid expansion. Without it, the state faces a $100 million shortfall.

Now the state Health Department wants to hire Bledsoe’s husband, Dr. James Bledsoe, to a full-time job and raise his current part-time salary from $85,849 to $171,698 for full-time work. Bledsoe’s son, Greg Bledsoe, is already on the state payroll as the surgeon general, getting $86,599 for six months.

So here’s another problem: Cecile Bledsoe (whose state salary as a legislator also got a bump last year) is opposing the Medicaid expansion that would preserve the state budget on which she and her family are increasingly dependent.

As far as we know, the Drs. Bledsoe, James and Greg, are perfectly qualified. But if Sen. Bledsoe votes — in effect — to blow a $100 million hole in the governor’s budget, his administration ought to consider applying the principle of last hired, first fired.