Arizona’s Brewer Prevails in Bid Over Expanding Medicaid
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Republican Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona scored a hard-fought victory against her party’s legislative leaders after winning passage of her plan to expand Medicaid to cover about 300,000 more residents.
The final 18-11 vote today in the state Senate capped five months of maneuvering after Brewer, 68, shocked the political establishment by calling for the expansion of the joint federal-state program for the poor -- a foundation of President Barack Obama’s signature health-care law that she had opposed. Her measure cleared the state Legislature with bipartisan support, leading Brewer to praise Republicans who sided with her.