PBMA Statement on President Trump’s Call for Healthcare Affordability Legislation

President Trump recently called upon Congress to enact “The Great Healthcare Plan,” legislation aimed at reducing healthcare costs for Americans, in part, by targeting the practices of big health insurance companies and their affiliated pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). PBM Accountability Project Managing Director Mark Blum issued the following statement: 

“We commend the Trump Administration for insisting that Congress make healthcare affordability a priority in 2026. We agree that effective healthcare affordability legislation must focus on the role PBMs and their vertically-integrated insurance company affiliates play in driving high healthcare costs that are burdening American workers, patients, consumers and employers.

“Americans have been victimized by the vertically integrated health insurance conglomerates that include health insurers, PBMs, group purchasing organizations (GPOs), chain and specialty pharmacies and medical group practices. The control these mega-corporate oligopolies exercise over the entire U.S. healthcare system inflates costs and extracts historic levels of profit from government, health plan sponsors, taxpayers and patients while obstructing access to affordable healthcare for America’s working and retiree households.

“President Trump has set the right goal in seeking to loosen the stranglehold that profiteering mega-insurance corporations’ exercise on affordability of care. Although President Trump’s Great Healthcare Plan articulates laudable goals, it is still, at this early stage, a relatively abstract policy roadmap. As Congress considers how it will refine the President’s outline into effective and actionable legislative policy, we call on Congressional lawmakers from both parties to finish the job of enacting drug affordability reforms they almost completed just over one year, ago. At that time, the Members of the Senate Finance Committee, House Energy & Commerce Committee and House Ways & Means Committee found common ground to unanimously pass historic PBM reforms to restore affordability of prescription drugs. The reforms received endorsement for enactment by Republican and Democratic leadership in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Yet, in the chaos of the approaching December recess, our Senators and Representatives in Congress never took a final vote. 

“Serendipitously, Congress’ yet-to-be-enacted PBM reforms are consistent with the broad goals of President Trump’s Great Healthcare Plan. Enactment of Congress’ already agreed-to PBM reforms would prohibit the perverse linkage between higher price of medicines and PBM profits. It would increase transparency throughout the prescription drug marketplace that the President calls for now. There could be no better way to launch the momentum that is going to be needed to enact the President’s new healthcare plan in a deeply divided Congress than to rapidly pass PBM reforms that Congress has agreed to, already, as one of its rare demonstrations of bipartisan agreement. 

“The PBM Accountability Project encourages lawmakers of both parties to act swiftly to enact PBM reforms that are absolutely necessary to restore affordability of prescription drugs. PBM reform has successfully run the gauntlet of winning overwhelming bipartisan support in both chambers of Congress. Enactment would consolidate this achievement and provide the best springboard imaginable for enacting the next, even broader set of goals articulated in President Trump’s call to make health care affordable, again.