Millions of fraudsters scrubbed from Obamacare rolls - Trump admin puts abuse at $10B

The Trump administration has scrubbed Obamacare of millions of fraudsters who’d signed up for the service during the Biden administration.

Obamacare, formally known as the Affordable Care Act, allows no-income and low-income earners to sign up to receive government subsidies for healthcare.

During the Biden administration, increased subsidies and weakened eligibility checks instituted by the administration drove massive ACA exchange enrollment growth, much of it driven by fraudsters.

ACA enrollment fell under Trump. It has risen to record levels under Biden.

— Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) October 2, 2024

Here are the receipts. ACA enrollment fell under Trump and increased under Biden. https://t.co/41MWi49f5M pic.twitter.com/hsnpbb29ez

— Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) October 2, 2024

However, according to a report from the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE), these fraudsters are finally put being in their place.

“Trump Administration program integrity efforts stopped about 1.5 million enrollees from receiving subsidies they did not qualify for and ended or blocked another 1.4 million through February 2026, for a total of 2.9 million people who had previously been improperly receiving subsidies they did not qualify for,” the report reads.

But more work is still needed.

“Unfortunately, improper, phantom, or fraudulent enrollment persists,” the report notes. “Recent experience during and after the 2026 Open Enrollment Period strongly suggests ongoing and persistent fraud, waste, and abuse in the system. We estimate 2.6 million improper and phantom enrollments remain, including over 1 million enrollments without a social security number.”

This crackdown comes courtesy of the Marketplace Integrity and Affordability Rule, which was implemented by the Trump administration last year, much to the consternation of Democrats and the fakestream media.

“The rule makes it harder for Americans to enroll in ACA marketplace plans, reduces covered services, increases premiums and out-of-pocket costs, and imposes new bureaucratic hurdles on families and states,” D.C. station WVVA whined after the rule’s implementation.

Unfortunately, the administration suffered a recent setback when Maryland District Judge Brendon Hurson, a Biden appointee, struck down some provisions of the Marketplace Integrity and Affordability Rule.

“Hurson … vacated eight of the rule’s most consequential provisions, including the creation of a $5 premium penalty for individuals who automatically reenroll in coverage and a policy disqualifying people who fail to reconcile tax credits with their income from receiving subsidies,” according to Healthcare Dive.

Despite this setback, the administration continues to push for more accountability. Recently, four million Americans were dropped from Obamacare for failing to pay their monthly premiums.

New: 4 million people dropped off the ACA marketplaces in the first month for failing to pay premiums — a decline far greater than in previous years. Enrollment was 19.2 million in February, down from 23.1 million during open enrollment. https://t.co/wlVmOZeBrL

— Paige W. Cunningham (@pw_cunningham) June 26, 2026

All this comes months after the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released “a bombshell” report revealing how easy it had become for fraudsters to take advantage of Obamacare.

The GAO revealed in the report that it had set up 24 fake Obamacare accounts in 2024 and 2025, 22 of which “had slipped through,” as reported by Politico. The accounts reportedly cost taxpayers a total of over $10,000 per month in free, undeserved government subsidies.

“The watchdog had four people attempt to sign up for coverage for plan year 2024,” Politico notes. “It found that all four of the applicants were able to get subsidies to pay down insurance costs even though they did not submit any information on citizenship, income or other needed requirements. While the Obamacare marketplace requested the information for some of the applicants, GAO did not submit any documentation. The watchdog said all of the fake applicants were still able to get coverage.”

“GAO pulled the same ruse with 20 applicants for plan year 2025. The marketplace approved coverage for 19 of the 20. It later cancelled coverage for one applicant after GAO didn’t provide requested citizenship documentation. However, as of September 2025, all 18 of the other fictitious enrollees still had accounts,” the reporting continued.

Congressional Republicans were incensed by the report.

The report is a “smoking gun that shows how this broken system, shielded by Democrat policies, has led to the federal government shoveling tens of billions of tax dollars to insurance companies through identity fraud,” House Ways and Means Committee chairman Jason Smith said.

Calling the report “a bombshell,” House Budget Committee chairwoman Jodey Arrington said the report showed “there is absolutely no justification for perpetuating these subsidies or the failed government-controlled Obamacare system Democrats are artificially popping up.”

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Vivek Saxena

Senior Staff Writer -- [email protected]
Writers and editors can be contacted at [email protected] with feedback, tips, or corrections.

V. Saxena is a staff writer with a decade of experience as a professional writer, and a lifetime of experience as an avid news junkie. He holds a degree in computer technology from Purdue University. Saxena also contributes to BizPac Review.

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