Phoenix House Statement on Federal Medicaid Cuts: "This Big Deadly Bill Will Kill Our Most Vulnerable NYers"

NEW YORK, NY (07/03/2025) (readMedia)-- Today, the House voted to pass President Trump's "Big Beautiful Bill," a proposal that guts the federal Medicaid budget for essential healthcare while slashing other critical social safety supplements that help cover food and daily necessities. Medicaid currently covers about 1 in 3 U.S. adults with a mental illness and 1 in 5 with substance use disorder. In New York alone, more than 6.6 million residents rely on Medicaid, including approximately 383,000 residents who receive substance use disorder treatment.

For Phoenix House's Suffolk County programs - the largest network of residential and outpatient substance use services countywide - federal funding makes up 17% of the total budget. Losing this funding directly threatens treatment access for hundreds of residents in the area and puts strain on middle-class frontline workers, the same danger facing all other Phoenix House locations and similar providers statewide.

Today, Phoenix House CEO and President Ann-Marie Foster, a member of the NYSBA Task Force on Opioid Addiction, issued the following statement in response:

"Let's be crystal clear: this big deadly bill will kill vulnerable New Yorkers. Shrinking Medicaid budgets and ripping other critical social safety nets endangers millions shamefully and unnecessarily. Thousands of our neighbors are already struggling on the streets with unaddressed mental health and substance use challenges. Now, they will face severely reduced access to life-saving treatment, likely leading to a tragic return to the days when thousands of Americans lost their lives to overdoses. At Phoenix House alone, Medicaid ensures up to 60% of our programs countywide - people who will have nowhere else to turn when this funding disappears. What's worse, gutting SNAP and other social safety programs will push more New Yorkers into crisis and drive up the demand for mental health and addiction services, just as the resources to help them disappear. Meanwhile, our already overworked and underpaid behavioral health workforce will face impossible choices as more providers are forced to shutter or scale back programs. This bill is an attack on our most vulnerable. We ask Governor Hochul to commit to a contingency plan that prioritizes the health, dignity, and future of every New Yorker."

About Phoenix House:

For nearly 60 years, Phoenix House New York and Long Island has helped thousands of people overcome substance and alcohol use in order to lead healthy, productive, and rewarding lives. Born as a model for integrated substance use treatment, Phoenix House has grown into a treatment network that offers short-term and long-term residential, intensive outpatient, and general outpatient treatment. Phoenix House also offers treatment for co-occurring mental health disorders, clinical services, medication for addiction treatment, health and wellness goals, and vocational and educational support.

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