New Mexico Is Not Poor—It’s Poorly Managed: Rising Spending, Straining Families

New Mexico is not a poor state. We are a poorly run state. Over the past decade, state spending has more than doubled. Yet families feel squeezed, with Medicaid enrollees still facing serious barriers to getting doctors appointments and quality care despite significant funding increases.

Annual Medicaid spending in New Mexico stands at $11 billion, nearly doubling since 2016, according to a Legislative Finance Committee report presented during a Tuesday hearing in Hobbs. Despite this investment, the program serves 31,000 fewer New Mexicans than before, and access to healthcare has not improved in many cases.

Allegra Hernandez, senior fiscal analyst with the Legislative Finance Committee, told lawmakers that significant investments in behavioral health and Medicaid have not translated into better outcomes for users. “Despite significant investments that you all, as the legislature, have made in behavioral health and in Medicaid more broadly, the systems are not improving for users in the way that we would expect and hope with these investments,” she said. “And spending has increased significantly, and these payoffs are not yet demonstrated to have shown up.”

The report found that expenses associated with Turquoise Care, the state’s Medicaid managed care program, have jumped significantly, with over $2.2 billion invested in rate increases to Managed Care Organizations over the last three years. Yet, access to care remains just as difficult as it was two years ago when the committee published its last report.

Health outcomes for Medicaid patients have been mixed despite the spending increases, and the burdens on the state’s Medicaid system have increased in recent years. The findings come as lawmakers prepare to return to the Capitol for a special session addressing looming federal funding cuts to Medicaid, with Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham urging budget measures to safeguard coverage.