Oklahoma coffee shop employing those with special needs hit by federal cuts
OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — A popular Oklahoma coffee shop known for creating opportunities for those with special needs is facing uncertainty.
Not Your Average Joe is one of several non-profits that have been hit by federal cuts from the Department of Government Efficiency, slashing AmeriCorps staff.
The shop focuses on employing those with intellectual, developmental and physical disabilities.
'77.5% of that constituency are underemployed or unemployed altogether after high school,' said Tim Herbel, founder and executive director of Not Your Average Joe.
Isaac Meyers would be in that percentage if it wasn't for this job.
'It's been like one of the best things that can ever happen,' said Meyers.
He's not doing it alone. Over the years, AmeriCorps members have worked alongside those like Meyers.
'They've just always been helping me to know more of what I can do and to help me have more of what we can do as a team,' said Meyers.
Herbel says over the last three years, Not Your Average Joe has had 22 AmeriCorps members.
'They have served as mentors for those with disabilities, they help us build capacity in our community and they helped us grow to the point that we could provide this amazing award winning model of inclusionary employment for those with disabilities,' said Herbel.
White House to send DOGE cuts package to Congress as Speaker promises quick action
Now that support is being cut and the timing couldn't be worse.
Not Your Average Joe is in the process of expanding, after Stella Nova donated all of its locations to their mission.
'We're about to hire up to 100 more Friends with intellectual, developmental and physical disabilities and so we were about to receive six AmeriCorps members to serve alongside those individuals with disabilities, but now that's gone,' said Herbel.
David Manning is neurotypical and works at Not Your Average Joe. He says the loss of AmeriCorps workers will be tough.
'Obviously less mentors that results in a harder training, environmental training and less time to prepare other employees for the job,' said Manning.
Not Your Average Joe is now looking for more volunteers and donations to help fill the gap.
To learn more, click here.
Another way you can always help is being a customer.
'Your coffee is going to make your day better, but that interaction is going to make your day even better and that's what it's all about,' said Herbel.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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On May 14, 2025, Kennedy said during a committee hearing that "because of DOGE," the agency found 8 million people on Medicaid who would be affected by cuts made for reasons of "fraud, waste and abuse." However, if DOGE did make this discovery, they did not appear to make any public announcement about it. The public face of DOGE, tech billionaire Elon Musk, often makes major announcements through his X page — and a search for "Medicaid" on his X profile returned no results concerning 8 million fraudulent enrollees. DOGE similarly uses X for public statements, and a search of its page for "Medicaid" also returned no relevant results as of this writing. Musk did claim in an X post on Feb. 10, 2025, without providing evidence, that the "magnitude of fraud in federal entitlements," including Medicaid, "exceeds the combined sum of every private scam you've ever heard by FAR." This post did not include hard data or any supposed number of fraudulent enrollees. DOGE releases dollar amounts of its purported savings on its website, but there was not a section for the number of people that the agency supposedly caught committing fraud as of this writing. No reputable news outlets have credited this supposed discovery to DOGE as of publication, and if the claim were true — or if Musk even claimed it was — it would certainly make news. Kennedy's comments during the May 14 committee hearing were in reference to cuts that would be made to Medicaid under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Here is the full exchange between Kennedy and Rep. Josh Harder, D-Calif.; see 1:53:00 (emphasis ours): KENNEDY: The cuts to Medicaid are for fraud, waste and abuse, and I'll tell you what that means. It means because of DOGE — and it's about 8 million people who would be affected — because of DOGE, we were able to determine that there are a million people who are claiming Medicaid from multiple states. That's illegal. It's theft. You're not allowed to do that. There are another million people who are collecting both under Obamacare and — HARDER: Mr. Secretary. That has nothing to do with the budget that is actually being proposed — KENNEDY: These are the only cuts that are being made. These are the only cuts that are being made to Medicaid. HARDER: That's not true. KENNEDY: Yes it is. There are another million illegal aliens. We announced the law yesterday, we're not going to pay illegal aliens anymore. The first public reference available of this "8 million" number appears to be a May 11 preliminary estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which found that "at least" 7.7 million people may lose health insurance coverage by 2034 if the "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" became law without undergoing any changes. An updated May 18, 2025, estimate from CBO, available for download here (go to the "Title IV — Commerce and Energy" tab after downloading and scroll to the very end), said "the number of people without health insurance would increase by 8.6 million in 2034," with 7.6 million of that number attributable to Medicaid cuts and another 1 million attributable to the Affordable Care Act. CBO cautioned that it has not yet completed "estimates for effects on spending subject to appropriation and estimates of the effects of interactions among titles of the legislation," meaning these numbers are subject to change. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act has also undergone changes since being passed by the House of Representatives on May 22, 2025, and is likely to undergo even more changes once it reaches debate in the Senate. It must pass both chambers and be signed by Trump in order to become law. Kennedy's explanation as to why the 8 million who would be cut from Medicaid represent "waste, fraud and abuse" largely matches with the text from the copypasta, seen below: Over 1 million are double-dipping, illegally getting Medicaid from two different states. Another 1.4 million are undocumented immigrants — and they're being handed benefits funded by your tax dollars. On top of that, another million are illegally enrolled in both Medicaid and Obamacare. Not all of these numbers are available in public documents, making it impossible to check every claim made here, so let's start by looking at the claim that is possible to fact-check. The claim that 1.4 million immigrants in the country illegally are on Medicaid comes from the May 18, 2025, CBO estimate (emphasis ours): Included in that 8.6 million total are an estimated 1.4 million people without verified citizenship, nationality, or satisfactory immigration status who, if section 41110 were enacted, would no longer be covered in state-only funded programs in 2034. While such immigrants are largely ineligible for federal health insurance, Medicaid is a joint state and federal program — and some states offer Medicaid or Medicaid-like benefits to people without legal immigration status using state funds, which is what CBO references. Thus, legally speaking, those immigrants who enroll through state-sanctioned Medicaid programs aren't committing fraud or abuse. (On the federal spending level, noncitizen immigrants — both with and without legal authorization — can be eligible for emergency Medicaid services, but the government doesn't keep track of an immigrant's legal status when collecting data on emergency Medicaid usage, making it impossible to tell how many undocumented immigrants have benefited from these services, per a 2024 letter sent to U.S. representatives.) As for the claim that 1 million enrollees are "double-dipping" into Medicaid from two different states, that is both illegal and a legitimate issue, according to a 2022 audit by the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of the Inspector General. (See Page 2 under "Federal Requirements" for the law on receiving benefits in two different states.) However, this audit found that the total number of beneficiaries concurrently enrolled in two different states was 327,497 as of August 2020; in August 2019, it was 208,254 (see pages 14 and 15). Thus, the most recent numbers available as of this writing aren't close to 1 million (see the first summary page). It is possible that the number of "double-dippers" has increased to 1 million, but that number isn't publicly available as of this writing. Finally, Snopes could not find any data on the number of people who are enrolled in both Obamacare, formally known as the Affordable Care Act, and Medicaid. However, in 2016, the federal government did crack down on duplicate enrollments, per a New York Times story; in that report, Judith Solomon, then-vice president of the progressive Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, said there is not really a benefit to "double-dipping" into both insurance plans. Eligibility for either ACA plans or Medicaid can change based on a person's or family's income level or other factors, meaning Americans often find themselves swapping between the two types of plans. The federal government provides a guide online for ending one form of coverage or the other, as overlap between the two is common; the IRS also provides tax guidance on overlapping coverage. Here's the math: According to the copypasta, 8 million people are fraudulently on Medicaid — 1.4 million of whom are immigrants in the country illegally, 1 million who are double-dipping into Medicaid in multiple states and an additional 1 million on plans under both Medicaid and Obamacare. That totals 3.4 million, meaning there are 4.6 million people unaccounted for. During the May 14 committee hearing, Kennedy said about 4.8 million people cut from Medicaid under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act would become ineligible because they aren't employed. "The last category is adults who are able-bodied, who refuse to look for a job, to volunteer, to get a job or to show — to take a part-time job," Kennedy said (at 1:54:25). Multiple Republican lawmakers also cited this number during a May 13 House committee hearing; at least one attributed it to CBO — but if this is a CBO estimate, it has not yet been released publicly. Snopes reached out to several Republican lawmakers who shared the number in the hearing to ask for documented proof and await their reply. CBO would not share its estimate or related documents with Snopes. To summarize, there is no public evidence, aside from Kennedy's claim, that DOGE deserves credit for the alleged discovery of 8 million people fraudulently on Medicaid. The numbers and categories of supposedly fraudulent enrollees from the post come from either Kennedy, who did not provide proof, or estimates by the Congressional Budget Office. While enrollment in multiple states or multiple plans is a legitimate issue, it's unclear if the numbers shared are accurate. Furthermore, the 1.4 million immigrants in the country illegally on Medicaid — as estimated by CBO — are on the program through state funding, not federal. "Affordable Care Act - Return Preparer Best Practices." Internal Revenue Service, 7 Apr. 2016, Accessed 21 May 2025. Broder, Tanya. "Health Care Coverage (Maps)." NILC, 16 Oct. 2024, Accessed 21 May 2025. "CMS Statement on Collaboration with DOGE | CMS." 5 Feb. 2025, Accessed 21 May 2025. Congressional Budget Office. Subject: E&c Reconciliation Recommendations. 11 May 2025, Accessed 23 May 2025. DOGE. "DOGE: Department of Government Efficiency." DOGE: Department of Government Efficiency, Accessed 21 May 2025. "Doge 8 Million People on Medicaid - Google Search." 2024, Accessed 21 May 2025. Dorning, Courtney, et al. "DOGE Sets Its Sights on Medicare and Medicaid." NPR, 10 Feb. 2025, Accessed 21 May 2025. "Estimated Budgetary Effects of a Bill to Provide for Reconciliation pursuant to Title II of H. Con. Res. 14, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act." Congressional Budget Office, 20 May 2025, Accessed 23 May 2025. "From:DOGE Medicaid - Search / X." 21 May 2025, Accessed 21 May 2025. "From:elonmusk Medicaid - Search / X." 21 May 2025, Accessed 21 May 2025. Grimm, Christi. " NEARLY ALL STATES MADE CAPITATION PAYMENTS for BENEFICIARIES WHO WERE CONCURRENTLY ENROLLED in a MEDICAID MANAGED CARE PROGRAM in TWO STATES." Sept. 2022, Accessed 21 May 2025. House Appropriations Committee. "Budget Hearing – U.S. Department of Health and Human Services." YouTube, 16 May 2025, Accessed 23 May 2025. House Committee on Energy and Commerce. "Full Committee Markup of Budget Reconciliation Text Part 1." 13 May 2025, Accessed 23 May 2025. MACPAC. "Overview of the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid : MACPAC." 31 Mar. 2022, Accessed 21 May 2025. Mathews, Anna Wilde, and Liz Essley Whyte. "DOGE Aides Search Medicare Agency Payment Systems for Fraud." Wall Street Journal, 5 Feb. 2025, Accessed 21 May 2025. Musk, Elon. "At This Point, I Am 100% Certain That the Magnitude of the Fraud in Federal Entitlements (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Welfare, Disability, Etc) Exceeds the Combined Sum of Every Private Scam You've Ever Heard by FAR. It's Not Even Close." X (Formerly Twitter), 10 Feb. 2025, Accessed 21 May 2025. Pear, Robert. "U.S. Officials Move to End Duplicate Health Care Coverage." The New York Times, 19 Aug. 2016, Accessed 21 May 2025. "Press Room." Accessed 21 May 2025. Snopes Staff. "Copypasta." Snopes, 21 Aug. 2019, Accessed 21 May 2025. Swagel, Phillip. "Re: Emergency Medicaid Services for Certain Non-U.S. Nationals ." 2024, Accessed 21 May 2025. "Take Action When You Have Marketplace Coverage along with Medicaid or CHIP Coverage." Accessed 21 May 2025. USAGov. "How to Get Insurance through the ACA Health Insurance Marketplace | USAGov." 6 Dec. 2023, Accessed 21 May 2025.
