New Jersey’s division of medical assistance has shifted its office’s focus to processing new Medicaid applications right now. That is good if you need Medicaid for the first time, but it is bad if your application is denied. If your application for Medicaid is denied, you have a right to a fair hearing before a Judge, but hearings before the Judges that hear Medicaid denials are currently suspended. This is a major problem for families whose family member is denied Medicaid. Normally, when Medicaid is denied, a family has a right to appeal, and a Judge at an administrative agency called the Office of Administrative Law has to review the denial and the appeal, and hold a hearing within a certain amount of time. Right now, the Judges who hear those appeals are not hearing new ones. That means that the person whose Medicaid application was denied does not have a remedy right now. New Jersey is calling this a “delay”, and the time limits the state would normally have to respond to an appeal have been suspended until the end of the month the governor declares the COVID-19 emergency over. If your family member had their Medicaid denied or terminated before March 31, 2020, and it has not been reinstated, contact Fredrick P. Niemann, Esq. toll-free at (855) 376-5291 or email him at fniemann@hnlawfirm.com for information about prosecuting an appeal during the COVID-19 outbreak.
Written by Nicole C. Tomlin, Esq. of Hanlon Niemann & Wright