Where to these people go?

I am writing to ask for your thoughts on the proposed Medicaid cuts that are part of the "Big Beautiful Bill" recently passed by the Senate.

While looking into the impact of cuts on Maryland residents, I learned that Medicaid along with the Children's Health Insurance Program provide health insurance for 1 in 4 of our state's population. Medicaid covers the cost of giving birth for 40 percent of births in the state, provides help for 1 in 3 persons with disabilities and also covers care for 5 out of 8 nursing home residents. The proposed cuts to Medicaid would result in loss of health coverage for 229,000 Marylanders.

There are also proposed cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which would result in 200K recipients losing some or all of their benefits.

In addition, some 190,000 Marylanders enrolled in the state's health care marketplace will likely lose their health insurance coverage if tax credits on insurance premiums are not extended.

I read that Republicans think too many people are enrolled in Medicaid, so they want to cut $625 billion from Medicaid and $300 billion from SNAP.

People who benefit from Medicaid and supplemental food and nutrition programs are the most vulnerable people — mostly children and the elderly — among us. So when you cut Medicaid because too many are enrolled, who's the decider? Who decides who gets kicked out? Without health care and food assistance where do these people go? They don't just disappear. They'll still be there. I suspect hospital emergency rooms will become the obvious health care option. If you're hungry and poor, what are your options? When you distress a population, is it possible that crime will rise too?

What's really behind these cuts? We hear that the most impoverished are being asked to pay this price so that billionaires and the very wealthy can reap the benefits of tax cuts. Billionaires who can buy their own hospitals are going to pay less in taxes. The poor get poorer (and hungrier and sicker) and the rich get richer.

So, Dear Andy Harris, how is this OK?

Sen. Mitch McConnell says about these cuts, "They'll get over it." I don't think "they" will get over it, but I think we will remember.

MARION O. ARNOLD

Easton