Kasich and Democrats want to expand Medicaid to cover 275,000 low-income Ohioans, but most Republicans in the house are against it. Some Statehouse insiders believe Kasich is considering using an executive order to put Medicaid expansion in place without the legislature’s approval, but Kasich tells reporters he doesn’t want to do that.
"I think at the end of the day, you need some sign-off from the legislature," Kasich said. "You need to have some agreement with them in one way or another as to how you proceed. Because you don’t want to get yourself into some sort of a showdown where you run out of money and you force it. That's not the way to do things. So I’m still patient and I take them at their word, but there are still some things we can do to, we think, help them out."
Kasich declined to detail the things he is considering. Meanwhile, Democrats and backers of Medicaid expansion are collecting petition signatures to put an initiated statute before voters. If they are successful, the legislature would have a few months to pass the plan and if it doesn’t, the issue could go before voters next November.
