A group of Democratic senators sent letters to 10 insurance companies on Tuesday, investigating their decision to work with the Trump administration to remove thousands from Affordable Care Act coverage.
The probe is being led by Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) and Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee Ranking Member Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont). The letters were signed by Senators Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisconsin), Angela Alsobrooks (D-Maryland), Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts), Cory Booker (D-New Jersey), Tammy Duckworth (D-Illinois), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon), Andy Kim (D-New Jersey), Chris Van Hollen (D-Maryland), Maria Cantwell (D-Washington) and Ed Markey (D-Massachusetts).
The recipients of the letters include Cigna, UnitedHealthcare, AmeriHealth Caritas, Centene, Elevance Health, Florida Blue, Health Care Service Corporation, Imperial Insurance Companies, Oscar Health and Molina Healthcare.
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It comes after the Trump administration announced in September that they are terminating ACA coverage for 760,000 enrollees to address fraud in the marketplace. The senators argued that the terminations wouldn’t have been possible without the cooperation of insurance companies. They added that the move relied on discredited, partisan analyses that treat zero-dollar premium plans and enrollees with no claims as indicators of fraud.
“Republicans are weaponizing fraud falsehoods in order to undercut the ACA Marketplace and kick even more Americans off their health care. This year, nearly 3 million people have lost coverage while millions more are paying sky-high premiums and higher deductibles for insurance that covers less. Aligning with Republicans and their so-called ‘war on fraud,’ insurance companies chose to participate in a collaborative effort with the Trump administration to inject yet more chaos and damage into the ACA Marketplace,” the letters said.
Specifically, the senators stated that the 10 largest issuers by Marketplace enrollment received and complied with a data request from CMS that ultimately led to the coverage terminations. The insurers sent “unsolicited communications” to enrollees asking them to verify their social security numbers, and gave CMS lists of those who did not receive or respond to the messages, according to the letter. These enrollees were then considered fraudulent and removed from coverage.
“Issuers agreed to carry out this request from CMS even though it was not supported by subregulatory guidance until such guidance was quietly modified by CMS on October 1, 2026, over one month after the 760,000 coverage terminations had been carried out,” the letters stated.
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The senators called on the insurance companies to provide responses to several questions by November 6, including:
- When CMS first contacted them and if the agency gave a legal basis for the request
- Why the companies did the mid-year eligibility redeterminations
- How many terminated enrollees have made a healthcare claim or asked for reinstatement
- Whether they plan to participate in another phase of these terminations
“We have many questions about the role of [insurance company] in this flawed process used to terminate coverage for 760,000 enrollees, and the judgment exercised by insurance companies that chose to cooperate with CMS officials without requesting clarification about the specific authorities being relied on to support this request or raising concerns to Congress on behalf of their customers, enrollees that your companies receive billions of dollars in premiums and taxpayer support each year to serve,” the senators said.
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