AUSTIN, Texas (AP) - Texas Gov. Rick Perry is calling Medicaid a "failure" as he defends his decision to oppose any expansion of the program as part of the national health-care overhaul.
Perry told Fox News Monday that adding uninsured Texans to Medicaid - as proposed by the overhaul recently upheld by the Supreme Court - "is not unlike adding a thousand people to the Titanic." He says Texas won't participate in the expansion or create a health care exchange required by the law.
He says he doesn't want to be part of "socializing health care" in Texas as part of a bill he considers unconstitutional.
Perry announced his intentions to oppose a state insurance exchange and a Medicaid expansion in a letter Monday to U.S. Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius.
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