COLUMBUS, OHIO — Ohio’s next Governor takes the fight against Medicaid fraud to the pages of the Wall Street Journal.
Today, Ohio’s Republican nominee for Governor, Vivek Ramaswamy, published a major op-ed in the Wall Street Journal laying out a real, conservative plan to defeat Medicaid fraud, lower healthcare costs, and put recovered dollars back into the pockets of law-abiding Ohio families.
The core problem? Right now, the system rewards waste. In Ohio, roughly 65% of every traditional Medicaid dollar comes from Washington, which means for every dollar a state recovers by chasing down a fraudulent home health agency or a phantom hospice, the state gets back less than 35 cents. The rest goes back to Washington. Few Governors are going to build a serious anti-fraud operation for a 35-cent return.
Vivek’s solution: flip the math. Cut a deal with the federal government that lets states keep a greater share of what they save when they fight fraud. If Vivek is elected Governor of Ohio in November, his administration will be ready to commit in January.
The numbers back it up. The Paragon Health Institute estimates $1.1 trillion in improper federal Medicaid payments between 2015 and 2024. In Ohio, a 10% reduction in Medicaid spending could yield $3.1 billion in potential savings, with another $1.6 billion returned to Washington. Nationally, if states across the country adopt the same shared-savings model, the figure could reach up to $100 billion.
It’s not theoretical. Tennessee already proved it can work. Under a shared-savings deal first approved by the Trump administration in 2021, TennCare has redirected more than $1 billion in recovered Medicaid spending into rural health, coverage for kids and pregnant women, and disaster-relief loans for counties hit by Hurricane Helene. Dollars taken from fraudsters were put back into care for families who play by the rules.
“Most healthcare policies force a painful trade-off between cost, access and quality. This one doesn’t: It takes money from criminals and returns it to the families who play by the rules.” — said Vivek Ramaswamy, Ohio Republican Party-endorsed candidate for Governor.
This is what serious leadership on healthcare looks like. Not a political slogan. Not another spending spree. A specific, technical, conservative reform that builds on work the first Trump administration started in Tennessee, and would slot in alongside the work requirements signed into law by President Trump in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
The Ohio Republican Party is proud to stand behind Vivek Ramaswamy, our endorsed candidate for Governor, as he takes this fight to the national stage and lays out a real plan to save Ohio families billions. Read Vivek’s full op-ed in the Wall Street Journal.
