By Marilyn Odendahl
The Indiana Citizen
July 30, 2025
An occupational therapist assistant for more than 30 years, Diane Thrawley stood under the shade of a towering tree in downtown Mitchell’s Friendship Park and ticked off her fears of more suicides and more abuse that could happen when the coming deep cuts to Medicaid will likely force people from long-term care facilities.
“There’s just a host of possibilities–none of them good,” Thrawley said.
Thrawley was among 37 individuals who rallied at Friendship Park Saturday afternoon as part of the national Families First day of action to raise awareness of the potential harm patients, hospitals and health care could face as both federal and state governments slash funding for Medicaid.
Nearly 450 Hoosiers participated in rallies or drove in caravans across Indiana to call attention to how the cuts could impact their local communities, according to Hoosier Action, a nonpartisan community organization based in Southern Indiana. A group of 45 gathered at the county courthouse in Terre Haute, 125 staged a “die-in” in South Bend, 50 handed out postcards during a Pride event in Fort Wayne, and 55 held a rally and press conference at Methodist Hospital Southlake in Merrillville. Also, 50 joined a procession of vehicles driving from Winchester to Richmond.
In Southern Indiana, the focus was on the rural communities that could be hit especially hard by hospital closures.
The day began with the Motorcade for Medicaid which started its journey about 8 a.m. in Bloomington and Martinsville then drove along two-lane roads over rolling hills and made stops at the hospitals in Brazil, Sullivan and Washington. The rally in Mitchell was followed by a gathering and conversation at the Washington County Action Coalition house in Salem.
Many of the attendees to the events were middle aged or senior citizens, and some said they were engaging in rallies and protests more recently because of the policies and actions of the Trump administration.
The people rallying in Mitchell stood on the sidewalk bordering Friendship Park and held printed and handmade signs that called for protecting health care and Social Security, saving Medicaid, supporting public education, and valuing diversity. Two picnic tables in the park were cluttered with snacks and water bottles as well as markers and poster board for making more signs.
Some of the cars that passed the group honked their horns in support.
Sherrie Wetterholt had traveled from Bloomington to take part in the event. Growing up in the 1960s, she became familiar with protests, but did not become politically active until after the November 2024 election.
“Everything in the world is happening to us and everywhere you look there are things being taken away, including people–they just disappear–and our rights,” Wetterholt said, hoisting her sign into the air as cars drove by. “The resistance has to start somewhere. It has to be in all small towns, larger towns and big cities.”
The cuts to Medicaid are coming from the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” a budget reconciliation package that Trump signed on July 4. A July analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation estimated that over the next decade, federal spending on the health care program will decline by an estimated $911 billion, and the number of uninsured people will increase by 10 million.
Indiana will likely not escape the pain of the reduction in federal Medicaid dollars. Currently, 1.83 million children and adults in the Hoosier state are enrolled in Medicaid, of which 23%, or 1 in 4, of the enrollees live in a rural area, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. In the next decade, KFF reported, Indiana could see a decrease of $20 billion in federal Medicaid spending.
According to Hoosier Action, some hospitals have already started reducing services in anticipation of federal cuts, and as many as 16 rural hospitals could close because of the reduced Medicaid spending.
Michelle Higgs, a Democrat who is challenging Republican state Rep. Peggy Mayfield of Martinsville, drove in the motorcade. She said during the trip she learned of a “huge disconnect between what people are hearing and what they understand.” Notably, she and the other travelers encountered hospital employees who were unaware of the Medicaid cuts and patients who did not realize their coverage through the Healthy Indiana Plan is funded by Medicaid dollars.
At one point on the journey, the caravan got lost on the country roads and had to turn around. Higgs said the misdirection illustrated what could happen when an individual under stress is trying to get a loved one to a hospital that is several miles away.
“We hope this amplified the concerns people have about Medicaid and the real ramifications (of the cuts),” Higgs said.
The event in Salem coincided with the arrival of the motorcade. About 45 minutes before the rally was to start, volunteers emerged from the Washington County coalition’s house on North Main Street to put up a “Honk 4 Hope” sign and assemble a display to welcome the motorcade participants.
Inside, Renee Mather, who founded the coalition 18 week ago, was the calm in the middle of the chaos. While she braided her hair, she detailed why the organization was started and how it came to be located in the 100-plus-year-old house, occasionally interrupting herself to give instructions about extension cords or logging onto a livestream.
Mather eventually walked up the narrow staircase to the second floor of the home. Looking across green space at the intersection of state highways 56 and 135, she outlined her vision for creating a place where the community can come together and bridge political divides.
She described it as a “physical space to heal.”
Once the drivers and riders from the motorcade disembarked, many gathered in the large parlor of the coalition’s house. They talked about Medicaid, the actions of the Trump administration and what their friends and neighbors have been saying. In addition, they heard from Logan Davidson, a special education teacher in Salem who is running as a Democrat for the 9th Congressional District seat and from the representatives of Brad Meyer and Tim Peck, who are also vying for the Democratic nomination for the 9th district. Currently, the seat held by Republican Rep. Erin Houchin.
In Salem, Thrawley recalled the comment state Sen. Chris Garten made during the legislative session about rural medical care. The Charlestown Republican asserted the cost of delivering care in rural hospitals is higher and Hoosiers who reside in remote areas made a choice to live in those small communities.
“Nobody forced you to move to rural Indiana where you are far away from a system, where you are in an area where it costs more to deliver,” Garten said.
Thrawley said, from her experience, she has seen people continuing to live in rural towns in order to be near their families while others are moving to small communities because they are being priced out of urban and suburban neighborhoods.
Heather Breman and her partner are part of the latter group. They moved from Hamilton County to Mitchell about six years ago because the cost of living was considerably less and they liked the quaint community. Although they now have health insurance, they cannot use it because the hospital is about 40 miles from their home.
Breman was at the rally in Mitchell, helping to organize the event and networking with people as part of the group Lawrence County Deserves Better. She has an idea of creating a kind of health co-op, which would be a clinic owned and operated by the community to serve local residents. However, in the meantime, she is frustrated by the current health care system and worried about what could happen as the results of the cuts to Medicaid.
“We don’t have to take this,” Breman said. “Everyone deserves healthcare.”
Colleen Steffen, executive editor of TheStatehouseFile.com at Franklin College, edited this article. She has worked as a feature writer and editor at newspapers in Indiana, Kentucky and Florida.
The Indiana Citizen is a nonpartisan, nonprofit platform dedicated to increasing the number of informed and engaged Hoosier citizens. We are operated by the Indiana Citizen Education Foundation, Inc., a 501(c)(3) public charity. For questions about the story, contact Marilyn Odendahl at marilyn.odendahl@indianacitizen.org.
