Democrats say impending cuts to Medicaid spending will result in service cuts or closures at five rural hospitals across Arizona.
President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, passed by Congress last month, cuts around $1 trillion in federal health care spending between 2026 and 2034 and will result in an estimated 12 million Americans to lose health coverage, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Democrats say those cuts will have a disproportionate impact on rural communities, which typically have a higher number of low-income residents who rely on Medicaid for health care coverage.
They point to an analysis by the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research at the University of North Carolina that shows hundreds of “at-risk” hospitals in rural communities across the country could be forced to cut services or shut down due to cuts in Medicaid spending.
Hospitals were considered at-risk if they served a disproportionately high number of Medicaid patients or had three straight years of financial trouble, according to a letter from Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) sharing the data.
“These cuts will push the physician practices and the hospitals with the higher percentage of Medicare and Medicaid patients to the brink of financial ruin, especially in the rural and underserved areas,” Dr. Vishal Verma said at a press event hosted by Copper State Victory, a PAC supporting Democratic candidates in Arizona.
In Arizona, five rural hospitals are considered at-risk: Page Hospital; Little Colorado Medical Center in Winslow; Copper Queen Community Hospital in Bisbee; Carondelet Holy Cross Hospital in Nogales; and Cobre Valley Regional Regional Medical Center in Globe.
The political fallout
At the Copper State Victory event, Democratic officials criticized Republican gubernatorial candidates Rep. Andy Biggs and Karrin Taylor Robson, arguing their support for Trump’s tax cut and spending plan is tantamount to support for closing those hospitals.
“And mark my words, if those hospitals close, Arizonans will die,” Arizona House Minority Leader Oscar De Los Santos (D-Laveen) said.
Both Biggs, who voted for the legislation, and Taylor Robson, a business owner and lobbyist, brushed off that criticism.
Taylor Robson argued the changes to the program, such as new work requirements and more stringent eligibility verification, will preserve the program's viability for the people who need it by combatting waste and fraud.
“Just like President Trump, I support protecting and preserving Medicaid for the most vulnerable, for our kids, our pregnant women, the poor and disabled, and real Arizonan’s who need it,” Taylor Robson said in a statement. “What I don’t support is massive amounts of fraud, duplicate enrollments and Medicaid benefits going to illegal immigrants and able-bodied people who refuse to work. That’s just common sense.”
With limited exceptions, immigrants in the country without legal status are not eligible for Medicaid coverage in Arizona, according to the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting, though some other states, including California, do provide Medicaid coverage to those populations.
And Drew Sexton with the Biggs campaign pointed out that the legislation included a $50 billion fund for rural hospitals that Republicans said would provide “immediate relief" to rural health care systems and blunt against the impact of Medicaid cuts.
“There’s a reason rural Arizonans continue to move away from the Democrat Party: they trust leaders like Congressman Andy Biggs to work for real solutions far more than the progressive Democrats who would rather score cheap political points over actually voting to support these communities,” Sexton said.
Rural impact
However, health officials in rural Arizona say the impact of changes to the Medicaid system will be felt by eligible Medicaid recipients and even local residents using private insurance.
Hospitals that serve a high number of Medicaid patients “anticipate a sizeable increase in the number of uninsured in the State,” said Jennifer Spears, a spokesperson for the Carondelet Holy Cross Hospital.
In addition to serving a larger uninsured population, those hospitals will also contend with the end of provider taxes, a mechanism states, including Arizona used, to boost the amount of federal Medicaid money they receive.
Spears said the $50 billion in one-time funding for rural hospitals “will not begin to offset the extensive cuts” and it is still unclear how that money will be distributed.
“Despite the challenges for providers across Arizona, Holy Cross and Carondelet Health Network are committed to providing essential care for the community,” Spears said. “Our efforts are focused on maintaining access to high-quality services to the best of our ability.”
Rural hospitals will likely now have to cut services available to all patients to make up for funding shortfalls, health care executives said during a Medicaid roundtable hosted by Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs earlier this year.
Neal Jensen, CEO of the Cobre Valley Regional Medical Center, said his hospital was able to hire speciality doctors, like a urologist, using Medicaid funds and that federal cuts will impact will make it more difficult to recruit doctors to rural Arizona.
“We'll figure out how to do it, but we're going to be cutting everywhere,” Jensen said at the roundtable.
Jensen said his facility is the only hospital within an hour and half of its location that delivers babies. Funding cuts could result in the end of those types of speciality services, meaning those patients will end up in the emergency room or travelling to larger metro areas for care, he said.
“That drive is significant and very much a hardship, and that's going to be amplified when we weren't able to bring in those specialists, bring in those doctors,” Jensen said. “Those people aren't going to get their care, and it's going to be a crisis.”
