Former U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland on Tuesday announced her gubernatorial campaign’s plans to tackle New Mexico’s troubled health care system, and said she plans to “work toward” a public option for insurance coverage.
New Mexico has the nation’s highest per-capita levels of Medicaid enrollment. Amid the Trump administration’s looming health care cuts, the state Legislature earlier this year passed a measure to put more money in the state’s Healthcare Affordability Fund.
“Short of a public option, Medicaid is the surest way at-risk communities can have health care, which is why we will work toward a public option if I’m elected,” Haaland said at a Tuesday news conference. “For those of us not on Medicaid but dependent on our insurance marketplace, I will continue to backfill the tax credits on insurance premiums that Trump cut and devote more resources to the Healthcare Affordability Fund.”
Haaland unveiled her plan a stone’s throw from the Presbyterian Healthcare Services Hospital on Central Avenue in Albuquerque. She spoke alongside New Mexico House Speaker Javier Martínez (D-Albuquerque), Sen. Linda López (D-Albuquerque), New Mexico Nurses Association President Jason Bloomer and Dr. Danielle Rivera.
Martínez likened Haaland’s plan for a public option to Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s efforts to use the state’s cash-rich permanent funds to pay for free university tuition and universal child care.
“New Mexico is oftentimes painted as a poor state, right? Yet, we sit on — soon — well over $100 billion in permanent funds,” he said. “I think the time has come for us to start to think about how we leverage those permanent funds…to ensure that every New Mexican has access to quality health care and, as the secretary stated, a public option. It’s always going to be the less expensive, most efficient, best way to deliver health care.”
Like Haaland’s campaign announcements on affordability and public safety, the 25-page plan is a roadmap for Haaland’s health care priorities.
Those priorities include banning medical debt from credit reports, growing the state’s health care work force and decreasing the cost of prescription drugs. She also said she would work to expand residency opportunities for rural, Tribal and underserved communities and would increase the number of mobile health clinics statewide.
Haaland praised the state Legislature and Lujan Grisham for passing and signing into law medical malpractice reforms that put a cap on the amount of money a jury can award in malpractice cases. During the legislative session, supporters said the bill would shield physicians from excessive damages and reduce the onerous malpractice insurance premiums. Taken together, backers said those measures would make it easier to recruit and retain health care workers.
If elected, she said she would track the bill’s impacts and make sure that’s actually happening.
“Now that we have legislation in place, I’m going to see if the insurance companies are lowering their rates and will insure doctors and hospitals here in New Mexico,” Haaland told reporters. “Insurance companies bear responsibility for the cost of health care, as well.”
The Legislature also passed laws that let New Mexico join interstate compacts for certain medical professionals, making it easier for licensed professionals in other states to move to and practice in New Mexico. Haaland said she would expand those compacts to include occupational therapists, physical therapists, psychologists “and other healthcare providers.”
Haaland said New Mexico has an outsized number of private equity-owned hospitals and said she would sign a law that prohibits investors from being involved with clinical decisions.
“There are many issues that make up health care — medical malpractice was never the only issue for me,” she said. “We need guardrails so they can’t continue to empty the pocketbooks of New Mexicans while making a profit. We will not let the shareholders make your medical decisions.”
