If you model this as telling you that people who previously would have had no health insurance now have Medicaid, while telling you nothing about those people otherwise, this seems like good news.
Not conditioning on this tells you that an awful lot of Americans need Medicaid and cannot do better. Which seems, if new information, like very bad news.
There is a third option, one that fits in nicely with your view of bureaucracy.
The rules for Medicaid enrollment changed: The Families First Coronavirus Response Act COVID-19 Public Health Emergency Unwinding FAQs (medicaid.gov) requires that Medicaid programs keep people continuously enrolled through the end of the month in which the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE) ends. The numbers are at a record high because new people are added, but the old ones don’t leave. And there is no plan to end a public health emergency that justifies expanded government.
There is a third option, one that fits in nicely with your view of bureaucracy.
The rules for Medicaid enrollment changed: The Families First Coronavirus Response Act COVID-19 Public Health Emergency Unwinding FAQs (medicaid.gov) requires that Medicaid programs keep people continuously enrolled through the end of the month in which the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE) ends. The numbers are at a record high because new people are added, but the old ones don’t leave. And there is no plan to end a public health emergency that justifies expanded government.