Washington, D.C. – In response to reporting that the Trump administration proposes to raise federal payments to private Medicare Advantage insurers by less than 0.1% in 2027, far short of both last year’s 5.1% increase and Wall Street’s expectations, the American Economic Liberties Project released the following statement.

“For years, private Medicare Advantage insurers have gouged American patients, healthcare providers, and taxpayers, overcharging for substandard quality while allegedly engaged in illegal monopolization, billing fraud, and bribery schemes,” said Emma Freer, Senior Policy Analyst for Healthcare at the American Economic Liberties Project. “While it’s a good move to target upcoding and flatten federal payments to these private insurers, the Trump administration must do more to hold these bad actors accountable. That includes ending overpayments relative to traditional Medicare, breaking up Big Medicine insurance conglomerates that combine Medicare Advantage plans and providers despite the inherent conflicts of interest, and prohibit abusive prior authorization requirements that restrict older Americans’ access to medically-necessary care.”

Medicare Advantage is the privatized version of Medicare and now covers more than half of Medicare patients. Intended to lower costs and improve quality, Medicare Advantage has had the opposite effect, costing taxpayers an estimated 14% – or $76 billion – more per patient than traditional Medicare in 2026, despite similar patient populations and coverage criteria across the two programs. Private Medicare Advantage plans also deny prior authorization requests and claims at much higher rates than traditional Medicare, stranding vulnerable older Americans without medically-necessary care to further pad their own profits. Meanwhile, the largest Medicare Advantage plan providers are the subjects of federal lawsuits and investigations alleging illegal monopolization, civil and criminal Medicare billing fraud, and a broker bribery scheme.

Learn more about Medicare Advantage here.

Learn more about Economic Liberties’ Break Up Big Medicine initiative here.

Learn more about Economic Liberties here.

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The American Economic Liberties Project works to ensure America’s system of commerce is structured to advance, rather than undermine, economic liberty, fair commerce, and a secure, inclusive democracy. Economic Liberties believes true economic liberty means entrepreneurs and businesses large and small succeed on the merits of their ideas and hard work; commerce empowers consumers, workers, farmers, and engineers instead of subjecting them to discrimination and abuse from financiers and monopolists; international trade arrangements that promote balanced trade and benefit workers, farmers and small businesses; and wealth is broadly distributed to support equitable political power.