Seema Verma selected by Trump to head up Medicare and Medicaid Services

NEW YORK (Diya TV) — President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday morning picked the founder and chief executive of a health policy consulting firm, Indian-American Seema Verma, to serve as Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

It’s the second appointment by the President-elect of an Indian America, last week, Trump selected South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to serve as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.

“I am pleased to nominate Seema Verma to serve as Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services,” Trump said in a statement. “She has decades of experience advising on Medicare and Medicaid policy and helping states navigate our complicated systems. Together, Chairman Price and Seema Verma are the dream team that will transform our healthcare system for the benefit of all Americans.”

“I am honored to be nominated by President-elect Trump today,” Verma said in response. “I look forward to helping him tackle our nation’s daunting healthcare problems in a responsible and sustainable way.”

Verma is best known for her work on Medicaid issues and her close ties to Vice President-elect Mike Pence — she designed Pence’s Obamacare Medicaid expansion model in her home state, known as Healthy Indiana Plan 2.0. She has additionally served as in an advisory capacity to several Republicans throughout the years, working alongside to add conservative elements such as health savings accounts and employment requirements to their programs.

The Healthy Indiana program was designed to appeal to conservatives, it askscovered people to make a small monthly payment to access health insurance. A missed payment can result in six-month lockout from insurance coverage. Those provisions aren’t allowed under traditional Medicaid, but Indiana got a federal waiver to implement them.

Nearly 410,000 residents of Indiana are members of the program, according to the latest data provided by the state.

Through the arm of her consulting firm, SVC Inc., Verma has worked on other high-profile Medicaid expansion proposals for Republican governors. That includes the state of Kentucky, where Gov. Matt Bevin has threatened to pull the plug on the state’s Medicaid program unless President Obama approves his pending request. Bevin’s plan includes a work requirement as a condition of receiving benefits and lockout periods for failure to pay, and is modeled off of Indiana’s Medicaid expansion model.

Republican leadership from the states of Ohio and Iowa have contracted with Verma’s firm to help submit their own Medicaid expansion proposals to the federal government that also include conservative provisions such as asking recipients to pay for some of their care, requiring them to work or to be actively looking for work.

Prior to SVC Inc., Verma worked for the Health and Hospital Corporation of Marion County, Indiana and the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials in Washington, D.C.

Verma may be a smart pick, says Indiana Rep. Charlie Brown, the ranking Democrat in the state’s public health committee. “She is a smooth operator, and very, very persuasive,” he says.

Brown worked in the aisle opposite Verma in crafting the Healthy Indiana Plan, but said she was effective across party lines at incorporating the Pence administration’s wishes.

“She’s very resourceful and intelligent,” says Brown. “But the question now becomes, ‘What will be her marching orders as they relate to Medicare and Medicaid?’ “