Family caregivers are now slackers and crooks
McKnights Home Care
By Liza Berger, Editor (liza.berger@mcknights.com)
May 1, 2026
Among the more unconventional and perplexing statements of the second Trump administration was one that surfaced in recent weeks when the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services pointed a finger at paid family caregivers in the Medicaid program.
During recent testimony before the House Committee on Ways & Means, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. criticized Medicaid-funded programs that pay relatives or others to serve as caregivers for tasks they “used to do as family members for free.” That includes paying them “for balancing the checkbook, for picking up the groceries, for driving somebody to a doctor’s appointment,” he said.
“And this is rife with fraud,” said Kennedy, at the hearing, according to NBC News.
You could say I experienced a less-than-objective reaction when I read this. In short, I was dumbfounded.
Not only was this statement offensive to the millions of caregivers who are sacrificing their time, finances and, often, emotional and physical energy, to take care of loved ones, it is just flat-out wrong, as advocates much smarter and knowledgeable than me pointed out.
“Medicaid HCBS programs are much more than supporting an individual with the daily and essential needs that many of us take for granted, like getting dressed in the morning or traveling to a medical appointment,” ANCOR CEO Barbara Merrill said in a statement. “Indeed, for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, these services support skill development towards greater independence, community integration and employment that enable people with I/DD to forego expensive public institutions and live full lives in their homes and communities.”
I was taken with the ignorance of the statement. In recent years, we have been inundated with information about the billions in unpaid work family caregivers perform in this country, often at a steep cost to their own health, finances and well-being. Did Kennedy not find merit in his predecessor’s first national strategy to support family caregivers in 2022? The widely hailed document offered 350 actions the federal government will take to help family caregivers over the next year and 150 actions that can be adopted by state and local governments, as well as the private sector to build a safety net for family caregivers.
It’s well-documented that family caregivers need help. The Medicaid program has helped to do its part with waivers that allow family members to receive some compensation for taking care of a loved one at home — which is often a win-win-win for the patient, family caregiver and healthcare system. And it’s hardly a killing. Depending on the state, a family member can receive around $18 an hour for doing the tremendously difficult work of caring for a relative.
Sure, there is fraud. Where there are people there is fraud. But, Secretary Kennedy, please leave family caregivers out of this.