�鶹Ů��

A contrite Legislature returned to the capital Monday with a series of concessions and the goal of quieting the bitter intraparty feud over health care that sent lawmakers into overtime. The House, which left the regular session three days early, gaveled open the session as loudspeakers blared the Beatles tune Come Together, and then politely convened a workshop on the Senate proposal to create a privately run alternative to Medi­caid expansion. But leaders in both chambers acknowledged that, ovations aside, the House may not have the votes to approve the Senate's Florida Health Insurance Exchange plan, or FHIX, which would create a privately run premium assistance program to provide health insurance coverage under Obamacare to as many as 385,000 uninsured Floridians. (Klas and Bousquet, 6/1)

As state lawmakers Monday kicked off a 20-day special session to finish a budget for next year, Medicaid expansion supporters took a different tack to get it passed: Using terms other than “Medicaid expansion.” ... "The House has made it clear they’re not interested in expanding Medicaid, and the good news is, neither are we,” said Dale Brill, a Tallahassee-based business consultant and former state tourism director under then-Gov. Charlie Crist. “We need a plan that doesn’t bend to the will of the federal government,” he added. “We need a plan that we can call a Florida solution.” ... Their reframing of the issue didn’t win over House Speaker Steve Crisafulli .... "It’s still Medicaid expansion,” Crisafulli told reporters. “It uses the Medicaid population, it uses the Medicaid dollars, and it uses the program’s rules. You know the saying, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck. It’s Medicaid expansion … and it’s fiscally irresponsible.” (Rosica, 6/1)

If Louisiana's next governor wants to expand the state Medicaid program to tap into billions of available federal health care dollars, state lawmakers have given him a way to help pay for it. The Senate voted 31-8 Monday for the financing tool contained in legislation by Republican House Speaker Chuck Kleckley. The vote gave final passage to the measure, which was earlier approved by the House and can't be vetoed by Gov. Bobby Jindal. (DeSlatte, 6/1)

As Texas legislators concluded their 2015 session in Austin, protesters gathered Monday in downtown Dallas to call for a special session that would consider a statewide Medicaid expansion. (Jacobson, 6/1)

Americans for Prosperity Utah announced Monday it has launched a "thank you" mail campaign to support state lawmakers who opposed Gov. Gary Herbert's Healthy Utah alternative to Medicaid expansion. The campaign is the first action by the new Utah chapter of the main political advocacy group for the Koch brothers, the billionaire industrialists pouring millions of dollars into conservative and libertarian causes. The mailer is going out in the districts of 11 GOP House members, who last session helped defeat the governor's plan to provide health care to low-income Utahns using $258 million available under President Barack Obama's health care law. (Roche, 6/1)