Updated August 7, 2026. Quick answer: partnership asset protection can follow you to another state, but it is not automatic and not universal. Reciprocity is a federal arrangement states are in unless they opt out — and at least one large state has historically stood outside it.
How reciprocity actually works
The rule is not in the main Medicaid statute. It sits in the Deficit Reduction Act itself, and the mechanism is opt-out rather than opt-in:
States with such partnerships shall be subject to such standards unless the State notifies the Secretary in writing of the State’s election to be exempt.
The practical meaning: most partnership states recognise each other’s policies by default, and a state has to actively withdraw. Where reciprocity applies, the state you move to honours the disregard earned under the policy you bought elsewhere.
🔴 What we will not tell you, and why
We are not publishing a list of which states currently participate. The only primary source we could locate is a state-published map whose own file metadata shows it was last edited in 2018. A 2018 map is not a 2026 fact, and a stale list on a question this consequential is worse than no list.
⚠️ Two further gaps, stated rather than papered over. We could not verify the current national count of partnership states — the federal pages that would confirm it were unreachable. And whether four or five states are “grandfathered” under pre-2005 programmes is genuinely disputed between a state programme page and a federal document, so we assert no number.
What to do instead: ask the Medicaid agency in the state you are moving to, in writing, whether it recognises partnership policies issued in your current state. That is a question they answer routinely, and their answer is current in a way ours could not be.
The part people get wrong: it survives death
Many readers assume the disregard only helps while applying for Medicaid. 🔴 It also reduces what can be recovered from the estate afterwards. CMS: “The State must also allow, in the determination of the amount to be recovered from a beneficiary’s estate, for the same amount to be disregarded.”
So the protection is doing two jobs, and both are worth preserving before you alter a policy — the change that can end partnership status. What recovery itself looks like: Medicaid estate recovery by state.
Sources
Reciprocity standards and the opt-out election: Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 §6021(b), an uncodified note to 42 U.S.C. §1396p. Estate-recovery disregard: CMS guidance on the partnership provisions. All read 7 August 2026. General information, not insurance, legal or tax advice on your policy. Your contract and your state’s rules govern.