Governor Kim Reynolds, the “ethically challenged” career politician, has a hard time saying no when it comes to campaign contributions from companies with business in front of the state.

On Monday, it was revealed she took campaign contributions from one of the two private companies managing Iowa’s Medicaid program, days before awarding them with a $100 million dollar raise. Sadly, this isn’t Governor Reynolds’ first instance of receiving money from a private company hoping to profit off her disastrous privatization of Medicaid.

Just take a look at another managed care company who benefitted from a close relationship with the Reynolds administration:

  • Following AmeriHealth terminating its contract with the state of Iowa, two companies – Trusted Health Plan and Iowa Total Care (subsidiary of Centene) – bid for a contract to help manage Iowa’s privatized Medicaid program.
  • Following announcement of Iowa Total Care/Centene receiving the contract in May 2018, Trusted Health Plan filed for reconsiderationciting “politics” and “subjectivity” playing a major role in the evaluation process.
  • For example, in a category that looked at past litigation, both companies received a score of 0.8 out of 3 points. However, Centene reported at least $23.6 million in penalties in more than a dozen states, while Trusted Health has reported only a single $25,000 administrative fine.
  • Centene, and its subsidiary companies, have made explosive headlinesacross the country for their denial of care and deep connections within state politics that have led to substantial state contracts.
  • Former Executive Director of Iowa’s Legislative Healthcare Reform Commission believes the bidding process for Medicaid contract is biased toward larger companies, who tend to have more lobbyists.
  • Iowa Total Care/Centene gave Governor Terry Branstad’s campaign $15,000 in 2013 and in 2017, the company’s Iowa lobbyist gave Governor Kim Reynolds $500.
  • Trusted Health Plan on the other hand, gave no money to Iowa politicians.
  • Trusted Health Plan CEO stated “I think they scored the way they wanted to score it” in reference to the large disparity of scores between the two companies.
  • This marks the second consecutive time “deeply concerning” tactics have been allegedly used to award Iowa’s Medicaid contracts. The previous instance, also involving Iowa Total Care, resulted in a court battle that resulted in a company losing its contract
  • Earlier this week it was revealed Governor Reynolds took campaign contributions from one of the two private companies managing Iowa’s Medicaid program, days before awarding them with a $100 million dollar raise.
  • As Governor Reynolds continues to try and defend her failing and disastrous Medicaid privatization experiment, it’s clear she is beholden to the private companies who line her campaign coffers instead of providing affordable health care to tens of thousands of Iowans.
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