California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, continuing the reversal of many of the Golden State’s progressive policies he once championed, will announce on Wednesday that he is seeking to scale back free health care for undocumented immigrants.The top state official will propose freezing enrollment of undocumented migrant adults into Medi-Cal, the state’s version of Medicaid, as soon as January and beginning to charge those already in the program $100 a month starting in 2027, according to a report from Bloomberg News. The new proposal would not affect the 1.6 million legal immigrants currently with Medi-Cal coverage, and all undocumented individuals would still be covered to receive emergency medical or pregnancy care.The rollback of the program aims to close a large state budget gap and could save California nearly $5.4 billion by 2028, according to figures released by Mr. Newsom’s office, which spun the move as an effort to bolster the health care program. “These changes are designed to preserve that commitment, protect coverage for millions of Californians, and preserve the strength of our values and health care system,” the governor’s office said in a fact sheet obtained by CalMatters.org.The new measure is a change in tune for Mr. Newsom, who ran for governor on the promise of universal health care. In 2023, California became the second state in the country to offer health insurance to all immigrants.Mr. Newsom’s success in pushing through the initiative solidified his stature among progressives within the state’s Democratic base. His turnaround a year and half later, however, is a gift to the state’s conservatives, who have criticized the program as expensive and out of touch with the desires of voters.In March, Mr. Newsom’s Department of Finance notified state lawmakers that it had dipped into the general fund to borrow $3.44 billion, the maximum amount borrowable by law, to cover payments to health care providers for Medi-Cal. The sum represents 10 percent of the total amount of state funding for the program.In order for the changes to take effect, the state legislature would have to approve them as part of the state budget. Democratic lawmakers in the state have balked at the suggestion of making major cuts to coverage for immigrants.“These are folks who are working, paying taxes. They should have access to healthcare,” a state senator, Scott Weiner of San Francisco, who is the senate budget committee chairman, said at a luncheon last month.The announcement is just the latest in a series of moves by Mr. Newsom’s toward the political center ahead of what is widely expected to be a presidential run in 2028. On Monday, he took a full-throated approach to California’s homeless crisis by calling on hundreds of cities and counties to immediately crack down on encampments on public grounds — another reversal of a previous stance.“The time for inaction is over. There are no more excuses,” he said.In March, he made a sharp break from his party on the issue of transgender athletes participating in girls’ and women’s sports, saying during an interview with the Turning Point USA founder, Charlie Kirk, that it was fundamentally “unfair.”
