Fact Check: Are 34 million able-bodied adults on Medicaid really unemployed?

On Tuesday, July 8, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins held a press conference where she addressed questions related to immigration raids on farms across the country.

Last month, President Donald Trump said he had received concerns from farmers that their undocumented laborers—some of whom had worked for them for decades—were being deported as part of ICE’s mass deportation program. At the time, the president stated that he would investigate the matter to protect farmers and businesses in the hospitality industry. However, his administration has since walked back those promises, with Secretary Rollins stating clearly that there will be no amnesty for farmworkers.

Rollins also stated that she was collaborating with Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer on a visa program to enable farmers to hire workers legally, but also hinted at a new plan that would involve American workers playing a more significant role in U.S. agricultural production.

“The mass deportations continue but in a strategic way, and we move the workforce towards automation and 100% American participation, which again, with 34 million people—able-bodied adults on Medicaid—we should be able to do that fairly quickly,” said Secretary Rollins.

This claim warrants scrutiny.

Are there really 34 million people receiving Medicaid benefits and not working in the U.S.?

As the president’s “one big beautiful bill” moved through Congress, Republican leaders—including Speaker of the House Mike Johnson—argued that adding work requirements to Medicaid eligibility would reduce the number of people taking advantage of the system. Johnson had especially harsh words for young men, claiming they were choosing en masse to play video games in their mothers’ basements while collecting Medicaid, instead of getting a job.

The comments made by Johnson and Rollins suggest that farm labor—some of the most poorly compensated and physically demanding work in the country—would be an ideal sector for those 34 million able-bodied adults they claim aren’t working.

But the data tells a different story.

In March 2025, the federal government’s website dedicated to Medicaid, aptly named Medicaid.gov, reported that 78.5 million people were enrolled in Medicaid, including around 37.3 million children. The agency estimates that CHIP enrollees account for approximately 47.5% of all Medicaid and CHIP recipients.

These numbers have dropped significantly since 2023, when around 96 million people were enrolled in Medicaid. By March 2024, that number had fallen to 82.9 million.

Based on the number of children receiving healthcare through Medicaid or CHIP, we know that in March, around 41.2 million adults were enrolled in the program. However, this number can be reduced by 12 million, which is the number of seniors who receive Medicaid benefits because they cannot afford Medicare, including 4.8 million seniors with disabilities.

“In total, 12 million people are ‘dually eligible’ and enrolled in both Medicaid and Medicare, composing more than 15% of all Medicaid enrollees,” reads a short blurb on the federal government website.

Thus, according to the federal government’s own data, adults of working age on Medicaid total around 29.2 million, not 34 million as was suggested by the USDA secretary.

A Misleading Narrative on Labor Force Participation Among Medicaid Recipients

The imposition of work requirements to receive Medicaid, included in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), mandates that adults without disabilities work at least 80 hours a month. There are a few exceptions, including parents with children under the age of 14.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), among Medicaid recipients between the ages of 19 and 64 who do not receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), 44% work full-time and 20% work part-time. In other words, two-thirds of the approximately 29.2 million working-age adults, 18.7 million are part of the labor force. These individuals either cannot afford the health insurance offered by their employer, have incomes low enough to qualify for Medicaid, or do not work enough hours to qualify for employer-sponsored insurance.

A 2020 report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) presented similar findings when it examined labor force participation among Medicaid and SNAP recipients. The report revealed that major corporations, including Walmart and McDonald’s, paid wages so low that many of their employees still qualified for Medicaid, or employed part-time workers to whom they were not required to offer coverage.

In Georgia, approximately 189,557 individuals were classified as “non-disabled, nonelderly (NDNE) working adult Medicaid enrollees” employed by a company (as opposed to being self-employed). When examining Medicaid participation among the workers of the 25 companies with the highest Medicaid enrollment rates, the total represented just over 10% of all NDNE working adults enrolled in the public health program. In Rhode Island and Oklahoma, the rates were higher than 18%.

Overall, the GAO’s report estimated that around 70 percent of Medicaid and SNAP beneficiaries worked at least 35 hours on a weekly basis.

Many of the companies named in the report, including Walmart, pushed back on the report’s findings, but did not dispute the data; rather, they challenged the implications it raised about the nature of the jobs they offer. Mother Jones reported that Walmart spokesperson Anne Hatfield defended the company by highlighting its role as the nation’s largest employer. The company, which earned around $19 billion in profits last year, does not see a misalignment between the size of its workforce and the rate of workers enrolled in government assistance.

“If not for the employment access Walmart and other companies provide, many more people would be dependent on government assistance,” Hatfield said in a statement to the outlet.

What Percent of Working-Age Adults Enrolled in Medicaid Are Unemployed?

So, while there may not be 34 million able-bodied adults ready to work, what about the 10.5 million working-age Medicaid recipients who are unemployed? Secretary Rollins may not have considered that around 10% are students, 12% are caregivers, and another 10% reported to KFF that they were not working due to illness or disability. Only 8% of those surveyed were either retired or unable to find work, which, based on March figures from Medicaid.gov, would represent a group of around 2.2 million people.

Get your game on! Whether you’re into NFL touchdowns, NBA buzzer-beaters, world-class soccer goals, or MLB home runs, our app has it all. Dive into live coverage, expert insights, breaking news, exclusive videos, and more – plus, stay updated on the latest in current affairs and entertainment. Download now for all-access coverage, right at your fingertips – anytime, anywhere.