Vance's Fraud Task Force Cancels Obamacare Coverage for More Than 760,000 People It Calls "Phantoms" — the Vice President Says "This Is Not About Cutting Off Anybody From Their Benefits," Dr. Oz Says "We're Not Paying Insurance for Nonexistent Ghosts," and Chuck Schumer Says the Administration's Answer to Rising Costs Is to "Kick Hundreds of Thousands More People Off Their Health Insurance"
On September 22, 2026, Vice President JD Vance's White House Task Force to Eliminate Fraud announced that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services was cancelling roughly 315,000 federal-marketplace Affordable Care Act enrollments covering more than 760,000 people, saying they were fraudulent or ineligible and that the move would return about $2.2 billion in taxpayer-funded subsidies. Another 419,000 enrollments were flagged for additional checks on immigration status and income, and CMS froze new agent and broker registrations for six months. Officials pointed to one ring of 40 brokers they said had enrolled 50,000 people. CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz called the cancelled enrollees "phantoms" and said about 35% of exchange enrollees never used their coverage. Vance insisted the effort was "not about cutting off anybody from their benefits." Health-policy analysts warned that legitimate enrollees who simply missed a notice could lose coverage. The cancellations apply only to the federal HealthCare.gov marketplace, not to states running their own exchanges such as California. Democrats called it retribution disguised as fraud enforcement, six weeks before the midterms and as premiums rise after the expiration of enhanced ACA subsidies.
“We're actually making sure that the people receiving Obamacare subsidies are actually entitled to receive them. Amazingly, we weren't doing that before. … This is not about cutting off anybody from their benefits. It's about cutting off fraudsters from stealing from these programs. … We had a system in this country that rewarded brokers, that made people rich for enrolling fake people in programs that are meant to ensure that our fellow citizens have health care. This was a scandal.”