The Department of Health and Human Services announced a major crackdown on fraud and improper payments in federal healthcare programs, with CMS identifying 189,000 subsidized enrollments in 2026 that involved duplicate Medicare, Medicaid, or CHIP coverage. The agency also acted to remove improper subsidies in every case where records showed the enrollee had died. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stated that the effort will prevent an estimated $738 million in improper subsidy payments this year alone. At an annualized rate, the savings are projected to exceed $1.5 billion. Officials emphasized that taxpayers should not continue funding coverage for people already enrolled in other government programs or for individuals who are deceased. The action forms part of a broader push to restore program integrity and ensure federal dollars reach the intended beneficiaries. CMS has been contacting affected individuals or their estates and providing a window to dispute any potential errors before ending the subsidies.

The cleanup builds on earlier enforcement restored under the current administration after previous years of reduced checks for overlapping coverage. CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz noted that prior inaction had allowed a backlog of duplicate enrollments to grow, and the agency is now systematically addressing those cases. The identified improper subsidies include roughly 120,000 overlaps with Medicaid, 58,000 with Medicare, and thousands linked to deceased enrollees. By year’s end, officials expect to prevent more than one million months of improperly subsidized coverage. The move does not cancel underlying eligibility for Medicare, Medicaid, or CHIP but stops the additional taxpayer-funded Marketplace subsidies that created the duplication. Kennedy framed the initiative as a straightforward responsibility to verify payments and stop waste before it continues. The agency plans to keep expanding these integrity reviews as part of ongoing efforts to protect the financial health of federal healthcare programs.