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Tracee Saunders

@traceesaunders.bsky.social
1.2K followers 115 following 0 posts

Assistant Professor, Penn State Political Science | Poli Sci PhD | MS Health Informatics | health policy, bureaucracy, social inequality traceesaunders.com

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Reposted by Tracee Saunders
Pam Herd @pamherd.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
We're headed towards the largest loss of health insurance coverage in US history. Along with millions losing Medicaid, Obamacare private plans are entering a death spiral--reduced federal subsidies pushed people out, and with falling enrollment, prices rise even higher www.wsj.com/health/healt...
wsj.com
Exclusive | Obamacare Insurers Seek Big Rate Hikes, Again
Affordable Care Act plans are citing rising healthcare costs and falling enrollment.
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Bat 🦇 Borus @matthewborus.bsky.social · 01/06/2026
I’m excited to share that @ksavin.bsky.social, @calliefreitag.bsky.social, and I have a new piece out summarizing our research on how the Trump admin’s attack on the public sector have made it harder to get and maintain disability benefits—which were already quite difficult to navigate.
theconversation.com
Getting disability benefits got harder after the Social Security Administration’s staff was slashed and program rules were changed by Trump
Researchers learned from dozens of interviews that the usual ways of resolving complex cases, escalating issues and holding the authorities accountable no longer work.
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Adrianna McIntyre @adrianna.bsky.social · 11/12/2025
Affordability of health care was the top-ranking economic concern among the public in February of this year, well before the expiration of enhanced ACA subsidies or looming changes to Medicaid were part of the public consciousness. www.pewresearch.org/politics/202...
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Bat 🦇 Borus @matthewborus.bsky.social · 11/12/2025
This summer when my doctor said that the antibiotics I’d been taking weren’t doing the trick and I would need inpatient treatment, my first thought was, “Well gee, first let me do a little comparison-shopping. I wanna find a good bargain.“
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Jon Oberlander @oberlanderunc.bsky.social · 03/06/2025
Great upcoming (and all too timely, given current events) panel on Medicaid with authors from @jhppl.bsky.social special issue
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Adrianna McIntyre @adrianna.bsky.social · 05/05/2025
This paper links Census records of *37.5 million* nonelderly adults to administrative records on Medicaid enrollment and death dates. Hugely impressive data feat to offer new and robust evidence on Medicaid saving lives.
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Edwin Park @edwincpark.bsky.social · 05/05/2025
How #Medicaid supports state economies, employment and state health workforces via @commonwealthfund.org: www.commonwealthfund.org/publications...
commonwealthfund.org
How Does Medicaid Benefit States?
Medicaid provides critical health care to Americans with low income and generates a powerful return on investment for all states.
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Anne Applebaum @anneapplebaum.wsocial.eu · 17/04/2025
If the IRS deprives Harvard of its tax-exempt status, that's very bad for Harvard but it's also a catastrophe for the IRS. Instead of a neutral agency that enforces tax law, it will become a tool of partisan warfare. It may never recover.
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KFF @kff.org · 07/03/2025
As Congress considers changes to Medicaid as part of the budget debate, our latest poll finds relatively few adults say they want to see a reduction in Medicaid spending, with larger shares saying they want spending to stay about the same or increase. on.kff.org/43uvXb5
Bar chart from KFF Health Tracking Poll showing various groups' opinions on whether Congress should increase, maintain, or decrease Medicaid spending. Breakdown includes totals and party affiliations: Total population, Democrats, Republicans, Independents, total rural voters, and rural Independents. Majority favors increasing or maintaining spending, with relatively lower support for cuts.
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Brooke Harrington @ebharrington.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
Evers, Pritzker, Walz and Whitmer: Midwestern governors reminding us what government *can* be.
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Scholars Strategy Network @scholars.org · 18/02/2025
“It’s a wonderful honor to begin my career as a researcher with the support of the Scholars Strategy Network,” said @traceesaunders.bsky.social on joining the Health Equity Scholars Program (HESP). Learn about her research findings on Medicaid enrollment barriers & HESP’s impact ⤵️
buff.ly
Saunders named as 2024-25 cohort member of the Health Equity Scholars Program | Penn State University
Tracee Saunders, assistant professor of political science and Social Science Research Institute co-funded faculty member, was announced in fall 2024 as a member of the 2024-25 cohort of the Scholars…
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Lisa Dubay @ldubay.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
E&C committee was asked to cut $880 billion to make way for tax cuts. Latest paper from my @urbaninstitute.bsky.social colleagues on what would happen to insurance coverage if the 90 percent FMAP for the Medicaid expansion was eliminated. www.urban.org/research/pub...
urban.org
Reducing Federal Support for Medicaid Expansion Would Shift Costs to States and Likely Result in Coverage Losses
Leadership in the House of Representatives has proposed substantial federal funding cuts to the Medicaid program over the next 10 years. This report focuses on the proposal to reduce the 90 percent fe...
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Edwin Park @edwincpark.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
New Urban Institute report on impact of cutting federal $ for #Medicaid expansion. If in place in 2026, states must increase their spending by $44b in that year (+26%) or drop expansion with 16m losing coverage. 3.4m would lose coverage right away due to trigger laws: www.urban.org/research/pub...
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Arrianna Marie Planey, PhD MA @arrianna-planey.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
Did I mention that, between 1990-2020, rural hospital closures increasingly occurred in counties with high levels of income inequality as well? www.shepscenter.unc.edu/product/rura...
shepscenter.unc.edu
Since 1990, Rural Hospital Closures Have Increasingly Occurred in Counties that Are More Urbanized, Diverse, and Economically Unequal - Sheps Center
The NC Rural Health Research Program tracks and studies rural hospital closures. Our most recent brief, , describes the socio‐economic, demographic, and health system characteristics for rural countie...
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Jake Grumbach @jakemgrumbach.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
Very nice forthcoming APSR from Cox, Epp, and @mshepruralpolitics.bsky.social. Rural hospital closures reduced turnout nearby. We want people who experience social or economic hardship to speak up politically--but hardship reduces your voice. gated: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
We investigate how hardships affect rural politics, considering the case of hospital closures. In the last two decades, more than two hundred rural hospitals have closed their doors or drastically reduced their services. Drawing from resource models of voting, our hypothesis is that personal- and community-level deprivations brought about by hospital closures should reduce election turnout. Empirical tests pair geographic information on the location of open and closed hospitals with data from state voter files to create a panel of over 10 million rural residents for the 2016, 2018, and 2020 national elections. Results show that individuals whose nearest hospital closed prior to the proximate election were less likely to vote than their unaffected counterparts. These effects are strongest for older and lower-income residents, but they decay over time so that voting likelihood resembles a pre-closure baseline within 12 months.
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Phil Rocco @philiprocco.bsky.social · 10/02/2025
Excellent piece here by @pmheideman.bsky.social: jacobin.com/2025/02/trum...
jacobin.com
A Key Opportunity to Check Trump: Stopping Medicaid Cuts
Defeating the GOP’s proposed Medicaid cuts, which will then fund huge tax cuts for the rich, is an urgent priority. It’s a chance to reestablish the popularity of the welfare state in American politic...
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Pam Herd @pamherd.bsky.social · 10/02/2025
Samuel Hammond argues that NSF should use AI to pick which proposals are funded—the NSF would only need 10% of its staff. This is not an Onion article.
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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 10/02/2025
New from me @thebulwark.bsky.social I explain why Trump's attack on university indirect rates is such a big deal, and how it represents one more example of an indifference to the rule of law. The "laws are just vibes" party is doing irreparable damage to America. substack.com/home/post/p-...
substack.com
Under Trump, Laws Are Just Vibes
The administration’s dangerous attack on scientific funding is part of a pattern of illegality and abuse.
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John Crowley @jcrowley.bsky.social · 09/02/2025
This is why crisis informatics, data science, GIS, and complex systems modeling is at risk: we create inconvenient truths for propagandists.
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Miranda Yaver @mirandayaver.bsky.social · 08/02/2025
I just wrote the lecture slides for Tuesday's Administrative Burden & Inequality in U.S. Health Care class on the effect of the Arkansas Medicaid work requirement, and reading about the insane complexity of the reporting process makes me so insanely livid that they're coming back to screw people.
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Ezra Levin ❌👑 @ezralevin.bsky.social · 02/02/2025
When I was a Hill staffer in 2009, a Dem trifecta was trying to pass universal healthcare. In response, Senate GOP released a memo detailing all of the tactics they in the minority could use to delay the effort as much as possible. I'm recirculating that 2009 GOP memo here. Take inspiration from it.
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Pam Herd @pamherd.bsky.social · 02/02/2025
Fantastic bit of good news! Looks like NSF responded to the court order and funded grantees will be able to access already dedicated funds.
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Social Scientist (Mostly) in Exile @exiledsocscientist.bsky.social · 01/02/2025
Quick reminder: a bureaucrat's likelihood to have the courage to disobey an unlawful or unconstitutional order is directly related to their expectation of being supported and protected. Democrats should be promising to support federal workers who report illegal orders or refuse to comply with them.
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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 03/02/2025
The executive branch does not have the legal right to cancel appropriated spending or eliminate agencies created by Congress. Trump and Musk are doing both. Entirely lawless and unconstitutional. The world's largest provider of food assistance shut down. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...
Musk tweet boasting of "feeding USAID into the chipper"“I went over it with him in detail, and he agreed that we should shut it down,” Musk said. “And I actually checked with him a few times [and] said ‘are you sure?’”

The answer was yes, he said.

“And so we’re shutting it down,” Musk said.

USAID staffers were told that the agency’s headquarters in Washington will be closed Monday amid the turmoil.

In an email to staff early Monday, the agency’s leadership said: “Agency personnel normally assigned to work at USAID headquarters will work remotely … with the exception of personnel with essential on-site and building maintenance functions individually contacted by senior leadership.”
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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 03/02/2025
I'm just a simple country public administration professor so maybe smarter people than me can explain if these options can't work and if others are better, but there is no strategy that involves waiting for something bigger than right now.
media.tenor.com
a man in a suit and tie says i 'm telling you ...
ALT: a man in a suit and tie says i 'm telling you ...
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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 03/02/2025
Just spitballing, but things that could happen today: *Court injunction protecting USAID *Dems demand hearings on Musk's role *Someone introduce articles of impeachment *Dem officeholders go to USAID offices with USAID workers *Refuse to conduct any more Senate confirmations until this is resolved
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Adam Sacarny @asacarny.bsky.social · 31/01/2025
I’m feeling sick. BRFSS is one of the most basic public health survey datasets. There is no conceivable reason to take it down.
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John Mullahy @johnmullahy.bsky.social · 31/01/2025
BRFSS walks the plank www.cdc.gov/brfss/data_d... www.cdc.gov/brfss/annual...
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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 29/01/2025
I will be speaking at this @scholars.org event on Feb 3. Join us! scholars.my.salesforce-sites.com/event/home/s...
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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 29/01/2025
Great explainer and visuals that up-ends the narrative that Musk and Trump have established about the federal government
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