JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – With less than three weeks until adjournment, there’s still an important multi-billion-dollar tax to renew, impacting more than a million Missourians. 

The Senate was moments away from debating the federal reimbursement allowance Tuesday, better known as the FRA. It’s a tax collected from medical providers like hospitals to support the state’s Medicaid program, bringing in more than $4 billion. Instead, members of the Freedom Caucus stood up, demanding the governor sign the defunding Planned Parenthood legislation first. 

“I don’t know why a Republican governor wouldn’t have signed that already,” Sen. Bill Eigel, R-Weldon Spring, said on the floor Tuesday. “But here we are; we are continuing to wait for a Republican governor to do Republican things.”

It’s an ultimatum that puts a key piece of Medicaid funding in jeopardy. 

“This small band of misfits can stop the entire process over something they already won on,” Senate Minority Leader John Rizzo, D-Independence, said. 

Just before the Senate was set to take up and debate the FRA Tuesday, members of the Missouri Freedom Caucus took control of the floor. 

“Honestly, I don’t see why this is a fight, why we’re having to stand up on this floor, why they are requiring for Republicans to have to stand up and raise the issue of the number one priority,” Sen. Rick Brattin, R-Harrisonville, said. 

The group of senators is demanding the governor sign legislation sent to his desk last week that defunds Planned Parenthood. The other request is that the Senate bring up and approve legislation that would increase the threshold of votes needed to approve a constitutional referendum. 

“If we do both of those things, I think that we would have a very productive conversation about the FRA,” Eigel said. 

GOP members in the House said they are standing by Eigel and others in pushing initiative petition legislation forward. 

“They can take up IP today, pass that and they can still pass the FRA and they can still pass the budget,” House Speaker Dean Plocher, R-Des Peres, said. “We have plenty of time for all of this to get done.”

Sen. Lincoln Hough, R-Springfield, stated multiple times that the budget cannot be debated or finished until the tax is renewed. 

The FRA is a tax that’s paid for by health care providers and brings in more than $4.5 billion, funding a third of the state’s Medicaid program. The last time the tax was renewed in 2021, not only did the governor have to call the General Assembly back into a special session, but he also threatened to make budget cuts because of lawmakers’ inaction. 

“I think a lot of us are scratching our heads and wondering why it is so important to hold up this essential piece of legislation for something that they’ve clearly, unfortunately, already won on,” Rizzo said. “It makes no sense to me to continue to go down this road and this obsession with Planned Parenthood and why our hospitals and nursing homes and everything is going to have to suffer because they can’t put the sword down on the pro-life, pro-choice issue.”

Regarding the legislation to defund Planned Parenthood, Gov. Mike Parson’s office said Tuesday that Parson is the strongest pro-life governor elected in Missouri and he will sign the bill on his own timeline. The governor’s spokesperson went on to say, “This deliberate dysfunction in the Missouri Senate is unfortunate for the people of Missouri and the senators trying to do good work for the people back home in their districts.”