This piece is part of MTFP’s 2026 poll week, where we’re exploring data on how Montana voters feel about their elected officials, environmental concerns, immigration enforcement and other issues. Montanans generally support work requirements for adults who receive taxpayer-funded health care coverage through the Medicaid program. According to a recent Montana Free Press-Eagleton poll, 59% of registered Montana voters said they strongly or somewhat support the increased Medicaid work requirements included in the budget policy backed by Republican lawmakers and signed by President Donald Trump in July of last year.  In comparison, 37% said they somewhat or strongly oppose those requirements. Most people who took the survey said they did not receive health coverage through Medicaid, the state-federal program for low-income adults. The largest portion of respondents, 43%, identified as having health insurance coverage through an employer, while 29% said they were insured through Medicare, which covers seniors 65 and older. Just six percent of respondents said they were covered through Medicaid. The tax and spending package, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, will add new eligibility standards and more frequent reviews for low-income adults who qualify for Medicaid. Enrollees will be required to prove that they are working, going to school or doing community engagement for at least 80 hours a month.  Health policy experts and lawmakers expect the new standards to have the effect of shrinking Medicaid rolls — either because some current enrollees will fail to meet the requirements or because they will fail to file necessary paperwork on time. Budget analysts predict that the anticipated enrollment shakeup will reduce the federal government spending on Medicaid by $990 billion over the next ten years as fewer Americans are covered. The policy was supported by all four members of Montana’s all-Republican congressional delegation, who touted it as a critical strategy for reducing wasteful spending and curb people taking advantage of the public benefit. Nationally, work requirements for Medicaid beneficiaries have been generally popular when subjected to public opinion polling, but pollsters have found that results are often dependent on how questions are worded and what contextualizing information respondents are provided. According to a June 2025 poll by KFF, a national health policy research group, most Republicans, 88%, and roughly half of Democrats, 51%, initially support work or community engagement requirements. But, the national poll showed, overall support for the policy dropped to about 35% when respondents were told that most adults with Medicaid already work or are unable to work, “and they could potentially lose coverage due to the challenges in providing paperwork to prove it.” In the KFF poll, support for work requirements also dropped when survey takers were told that the policy wouldn’t significantly impact overall employment and would increase administrative costs for states. Alternatively, the support for work requirements increased when respondents heard the argument that the policy “could save money and help fund Medicaid for groups like the elderly, people with disabilities, and low-income children.” The MTFP-Eagleton Poll surveyed Montana voters on overall perception of the 80-hour-a-month work requirements provision in “recently approved legislation” without additional context, while noting that the new congressional measure exempts several demographic groups from the new eligibility standards. In response to the description of the question, 37% of respondents said they strongly supported the policy, with 22% saying they were somewhat in support. Less than a third of respondents, 23%, said they strongly opposed the work requirements provisions, while 14% said they were somewhat opposed. The MTFP-Eagleton poll surveyed 801 registered voters through telephone interviews and text-to-web questionnaires. Data was collected from Dec. 23, 2025 to Jan. 3, 2026. The poll, which was weighted to reflect the demographics of the state’s voters, has an overall margin of error of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points. This piece is part of the Montana Insights project, which is commissioning rounds of polling to help MTFP readers understand public sentiment on key Montana policy issues. Further findings from the Dec. 2025-Jan. 2026 poll are available here. The post Most Montanans support GOP-backed work requirements for Medicaid beneficiaries appeared first on Montana Free Press. ...read more read less