Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) is staking out his spot as a populist defender of Medicaid in opposition to the steep cuts contained in the House-passed megabill to fund President Trump’s domestic agenda.

The senior senator from Missouri — who as the state's attorney general once signed on to a lawsuit seeking to overturn the Affordable Care Act — has made his position clear: He will not support a bill that cuts Medicaid benefits.

Hawley has long warned his party against Medicaid cuts; the $800 billion question is whether other senators will join him.

He joined with Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) during a marathon series of votes on the budget resolution in April to introduce an amendment that would have stripped the House’s directive to find $880 billion in savings. The amendment was not adopted, but Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) also voted for it.

Earlier this month, Hawley wrote in a New York Times op-ed that slashing health care for the working poor “is both morally wrong and politically suicidal.”

“Republicans need to open their eyes: Our voters support social insurance programs,” Hawley wrote. “More than that, our voters depend on those programs.”

Hawley is adamant that Republicans take President Trump seriously when he says they should not touch Medicaid benefits and instead focus on “waste, fraud and abuse.”

“We ought to just do what the president says,” Hawley said late last week, after the........

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