INDIANPOLIS (WISH) — The author of a bill to expedite squatter removals said Monday existing trespassing laws could tie up property owners in unrelated landlord-tenant regulations.

The bill defines a squatter as anyone who occupies someone else’s property and does not have and never had a rental agreement or the owner’s permission. A property owner could provide a sworn statement that someone was a squatter, whereupon law enforcement would have to remove the person within 48 hours. Bill author Sen. Mike Gaskill, R-Pendleton, said police in his district are encountering an increasing number of squatters. He said under current laws, a squatter could claim to be a tenant. At that point, any effort to remove them would have to be diverted into landlord-tenant procedures.

“What has happened around the country is people have had trespassers, squatters, and then had to go through a court proceeding and wait for a hearing to get them removed,” he said.

A person accused of squatting could defend themselves by providing documentation showing they had permission to be on the property, at which point the property owner could face perjury charges.

The bill passed the Senate 48-1 earlier this session and cleared the House by a vote of 72-18 on Monday. Rep. Matt Pierce, D-Bloomington, said the bill turns law enforcement into finders of fact in the absence of a judge. He said the state already has laws to expedite the removal of unauthorized persons from private property.

“We don’t need to create an entire new body of law that has no judicial officer, no finder of fact, no determiner of law in the whole process,” he said. “Once the person is removed from the property, now the burden is on them to go into court and fight it out.”

The measure has to go back to the Senate because the House made some changes in committee. Gaskill said he worked with the House on those changes and will ask the Senate to accept them.

On the state and federal levels, Medicaid is under attack, with politicians spreading exaggerations and falsehoods, trivializing the program, and working hard to strip Indiana of affordable care.

Reading the news right now, you might get the idea that Medicaid is expendable. On the state and federal levels, Medicaid is under attack, with politicians spreading exaggerations and falsehoods, trivializing the program, and working hard to strip Hoosiers of affordable health care.

In Indianapolis, legislators are pushing Senate Bill 2, their effort to kick hundreds of thousands of people off of the program.

The reality isn’t reported as often: that Medicaid is a program that makes our state and country great. There are 1.8 million people in Indiana who are enrolled in Medicaid. About 40 percent of births are Medicaid-covered.

Indiana relies on the care provided by Planned Parenthood

Planned Parenthood is a key provider of essential care for Medicaid recipients in Indiana. We are here for Hoosiers when they need birth control, wellness exams, and preventive screenings, with roughly one-third of our patients using Medicaid to cover that care. 

This week, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case out of South Carolina that could threaten this care and Planned Parenthood’s role in the program. Federal law requires that Medicaid include “any qualified provider” in the program. But in South Carolina, lawmakers are attempting to cut Planned Parenthood out solely because of its association with abortion care. 

Opinion: HIP faces deep cuts as Republicans hide behind Medicaid’s complexity

If the Supreme Court allows states to ignore federal law and target a trusted provider solely based on politics, Indiana will be less free and less healthy. With cuts to care and removal of access, unplanned pregnancies will go up, cancer diagnoses will be missed, and sexually transmitted infections will go untreated. 

Most patients on Medicaid are people with low incomes who don’t have access to private health insurance and already face significant barriers to care — and, in Indiana, 65% are working while enrolled in the program.

Seniors depend on Medicaid to pay for long-term care. Families depend on Medicaid to keep their kids healthy. As many as one-third of our patients in Indiana rely on Medicaid to access essential family planning and reproductive health care.

Medicaid provides coverage of birth control, sexually transmitted infection (STI) testing and treatment, annual wellness exams and preventive screenings, life-saving cancer screenings, and more.

Medicaid is under attack, and Indiana will suffer because of it

Attacks on Medicaid are coming from politicians, too. In Congress, it has been widely reported that Republican leaders are weighing enormous national cuts to Medicaid to pay for an extension of tax cuts for the wealthy.

And here in Indiana, Republican legislators are advancing Senate Bill 2, which would kick more than 200,000 people off the Healthy Indiana Plan, one of the state’s largest Medicaid programs.

Opinion: Indiana’s startling Medicaid math forces unpleasant choices

If any of these efforts succeed, the consequences for Indiana will be catastrophic. Indiana already has some of the highest health care costs in the country and one of the worst infant mortality rates in the country. Rural hospitals continue to close, and more than half have eliminated labor and delivery services. If Medicaid cuts limit or close Planned Parenthood health centers, pregnant patients in rural Indiana — already driving a median of 30–35 minutes for OB care — may go without necessary services.

The state cannot afford to lose Planned Parenthood’s services. If Indiana copies South Carolina to block Medicaid patients from accessing Planned Parenthood, other providers will not be able to absorb the patient load.

We’ve already seen what happened in Indiana when Planned Parenthood was forced to close some of our health centers– defunding led to an HIV epidemic. Elsewhere, removing access to Planned Parenthood through Medicaid has had negative consequences, too. When Texas blocked Medicaid from covering Planned Parenthood, pregnancy-related deaths doubled.

The politicians pushing for Medicaid cuts and blocking free choice of Medicaid recipients to choose Planned Parenthood don’t seem to care about this. What they care about is punishment: punishing our organization and punishing the patients who rely on us.

To our patients, please know that we are fighting this every step of the way – no matter what. We will be providing care as long as we can, and we are advocating to state and federal elected officials about the importance of Medicaid and the health care safety net. Medicaid is a critical program in Indiana and across the country, and if politicians do the right thing, it can continue to be for years to come.

Rebecca Gibron is the CEO for Planned Parenthood in Indiana.