White House fraud task force will remove more than 760,000 Obamacare enrollees, some of whom may not exist

A White House task force will remove hundreds of thousands of enrollees from Affordable Care Act coverage, citing widespread fraud, Vice President JD Vance announced Tuesday alongside Mehmet Oz, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The action will save $2.2 billion in improperly paid federal subsidies, Vance said at a news conference.

Some of these more than 760,000 people are so-called phantom enrollees who don’t exist, while others may have been enrolled without their knowledge, Oz said.

The Trump administration will also suspend brokers and agents involved in improperly signing up enrollees and place a six-month moratorium on new brokers and agents, he added. The Biden administration in 2024 also suspended hundreds of brokers and agents for suspected fraud, which ramped up after federal subsidies were made more generous in 2021.

Another 419,000 people will be subject to additional verification, including making sure they meet the income thresholds and are legal residents.

The latest move comes as Republicans are trying to show they are cracking down on healthcare fraud, including in Medicaid and Medicare, ahead of the midterm elections in November. The action will save taxpayers money, strengthen the federal health insurance programs and ensure that those who need health coverage have access to it, GOP officials argue.

The steeply rising cost of healthcare is among voters’ top concerns, and Democrats are highlighting their opponents’ support of sweeping cuts to Medicaid as part of President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” and the expiration of the enhanced Obamacare premium subsidies this year. The two measures are expected to result in millions of people losing their coverage in coming years.

Moreover, healthcare premiums for Obamacare, employer-based coverage and Medicare soared for 2026 and are expected to jump again for the coming year — adding to Americans’ affordability woes.

Some 19.2 million people were enrolled in Affordable Care Act coverage as of February, according to the latest data from the Department of Health and Human Services — down from 21.8 million people the same period the year before. Enrollment nearly doubled after the enhanced subsidies were launched.

As part of the enhancement, lower-income Americans could sign up for coverage with no premiums and higher-income ones became eligible for assistance for the first time.

Criminals, largely brokers and agents, took advantage of this enhanced assistance and began enrolling enrollees and switching them to different plans without their knowledge. Some were unaware of the changes.

The Biden administration suspended 850 brokers and agents suspected of fraud in 2024, though Trump officials later quietly reinstated several hundred of them.

The Affordable Care Act has long been a target for Trump, who unsuccessfully sought for years to repeal it and then to weaken it.

One of the president’s healthcare advisors from his first administration, Brian Blase, has been releasing reports about widespread enrollment fraud in the Affordable Care Act. His think tank, Paragon Health Institute, has pointed out that nearly 12 million policyholders had no medical claims in 2024, suggesting these were “phantom enrollees.”

Oz echoed this argument, saying 35% of enrollees never used the program — about twice the traditional rate of those with insurance. Oz also noted that 1.1 million enrollees did not have Social Security numbers on file. Going forward, all applicants must include their Social Security numbers, and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is adding more guardrails for brokers and agents seeking to enroll people, he said.

Now that ACA’s enhanced premium subsidies have expired, only people who earn less than 400% of the poverty level are eligible for assistance. That equates to $62,600 for an individual and $128,600 for a family of four.

Brad Woodhouse, president of advocacy group Protect Our Care, said in a statement that the task force is “a political stunt designed to throw even more people off their coverage while pretending to save taxpayers’ money.”

白宫一个特别工作组将取消数十万名平价医疗法案参保人的资格，理由是存在普遍的欺诈行为。副总统 JD Vance 周二与医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心主任 Mehmet Oz 一同宣布了这一消息。

万斯在新闻发布会上表示，此举将节省22亿美元不当支付的联邦补贴。

奥兹表示，这76万多人中，有些是所谓的“幽灵参保人”，他们根本不存在；而另一些人可能是在不知情的情况下被注册的。

他还补充说，特朗普政府还将暂停那些参与不当招揽参保人的经纪人和代理人的资格，并暂停新经纪人和代理人的注册，为期六个月。拜登政府在2024年也曾因涉嫌欺诈暂停了数百名经纪人和代理人的资格，而此类欺诈行为在2021年联邦补贴力度加大后愈演愈烈。

另有 419,000 人将接受额外核实，包括确保他们符合收入门槛和合法居民身份。

共和党此举正值其试图在11月中期选举前表明其正在严厉打击医疗保健欺诈行为之际，其中包括医疗补助计划（Medicaid）和医疗保险计划（Medicare）中的欺诈行为。共和党官员辩称，此举将为纳税人节省资金，加强联邦医疗保险计划，并确保所有需要医疗保险的人都能获得保障。

医疗保健成本的急剧上涨是选民最关心的问题之一，民主党人着重指出，他们的对手支持大幅削减医疗补助计划（Medicaid），这是特朗普总统“宏伟法案”的一部分，同时今年还将到期奥巴马医改的额外保费补贴。预计这两项措施将在未来几年导致数百万人失去医疗保险。

此外，奥巴马医改、雇主提供的医疗保险和联邦医疗保险的保费在 2026 年大幅上涨，预计来年还会再次上涨——这加剧了美国人的负担能力问题。

根据美国卫生与公众服务部最新数据，截至2月份，约有1920万人参加了《平价医疗法案》（Affordable Care Act）的医保，低于去年同期的2180万人。在政府推出增强型补贴后，参保人数几乎翻了一番。

作为这项改进措施的一部分，低收入美国人可以免费获得医疗保险，而高收入美国人也首次有资格获得援助。

犯罪分子，主要是经纪人和代理人，利用这种加强的援助政策，开始招募参保人，并在他们不知情的情况下将他们转到不同的保险计划。有些人甚至对这些变更毫不知情。

拜登政府在 2024 年暂停了 850 名涉嫌欺诈的经纪人和代理人的资格，但特朗普政府官员后来悄悄地恢复了其中数百人的资格。

《平价医疗法案》长期以来一直是特朗普的目标，他多年来一直试图废除该法案，然后又试图削弱该法案，但均未成功。

总统第一任政府时期的一位医疗保健顾问布莱恩·布莱斯(Brian Blase)一直在发布报告，揭露《平价医疗法案》(Affordable Care Act)中存在广泛的参保欺诈行为。他所在的智库“帕拉贡健康研究所”(Paragon Health Institute)指出，近1200万投保人在2024年没有任何医疗索赔记录，这表明这些人可能是“虚假参保人”。

奥兹也赞同这一观点，他指出，35%的参保者从未使用过该计划——这一比例约为传统保险参保率的两倍。奥兹还提到，有110万参保者没有登记社会安全号码。他表示，今后所有申请人都必须提供社会安全号码，而且医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心（CMS）正在为试图招募人员的经纪人和代理人增加更多监管措施。

现在，《平价医疗法案》（ACA）的额外保费补贴已经到期，只有收入低于贫困线400%的人才有资格获得援助。这相当于个人年收入62,600美元，四口之家年收入128,600美元。

倡导组织“保护我们的医疗保健”主席布拉德·伍德豪斯在一份声明中表示，该工作组是“一场政治噱头，旨在让更多的人失去医疗保险，同时假装节省纳税人的钱”。