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Senate votes for a 'contingency' medicaid fraud unit

ND Legislature

The Senate has agreed to establish a “Medicaid fraud” unit in the Attorney Generals’ office – on a contingency basis.

North Dakota is the only state that doesn’t have such a unit. The state has had a waiver – but the federal Center for Medicare and Medicaid has told the state that waiver likely end soon. However, CMS hasn’t given a definite date when the waiver would disappear.

The amendment would establish the fraud unit if and when CMS gives the state a deadline—sometime before the next Legislative session.

"There's a real feeling we're getting to that 'drop dead' dates, where they say we're going to have to have the unit," Sen. Ron Sorvaag (R-Fargo) told the Senate. "If we leave this chamber without doing it this session, and we have to before we come back in 2019, we're going to have to come back in a special session. That's not an option."

Sorvaag said at stake could be millions of federal Medicaid dollars.

The bill will likely go to a conference committee.

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