Thousands of Minnesotans with disabilities, mental health needs, and addiction are waking up to find their care providers gone — not because those providers did anything wrong, but because a state agency ran out of time.

Minnesota's Department of Human Services was required to revalidate more than 5,000 providers of high-risk Medicaid programs by May 31, 2026, as part of a corrective action plan with the federal government. The agency said in March it was on track. It wasn't. Of more than 5,000 providers, only around 1,000 were approved. The rest were left pending — or terminated.

Providers say they submitted every document the state asked for. Many never heard back. Some received termination letters citing site visits that never happened. Now their organizations are in chaos, their patients have nowhere to go, and their staff face an uncertain future.

"They disenrolled thousands of providers simply because they didn't get the job done," said Josh Berg, service director for Accessible Space Inc., a disability housing provider.

The people losing access to care are among the most vulnerable in our state. Adults with developmental disabilities who rely on residential support. People in addiction recovery who need continuity of care to stay on track. "If we disrupted somebody's care, they could end up in another system, in our homeless population, in our criminal justice system," said Cari McCann, executive director of Great River Homes.

The revalidation program was created to root out fraud — but the providers being disenrolled are the legitimate ones who followed the rules and still got caught in the state's failure to process their applications in time.

We are calling on the Minnesota Department of Human Services and state lawmakers to immediately reinstate all providers who submitted their required documentation and are still awaiting a final review. This needs to be resolved now, before more Minnesotans lose access to the care they depend on.

The state created this crisis. The state must fix it.