Dr. Oz Believes There Are Millions Of Ineligible ObamaCare Enrollees

Dr. Mehmet Oz, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator, rushed to help an older woman who collapsed during President's speech at Verst Logistics in Kentucky yesterday.  The guy is a real doctor.

Three days before, Dr. Oz gave an interview to NBC News where he said some people on ACA plans should not be enrolled and he expects the rate of ObamaCare enrollment will continue to fall to somewhere around 19 million.  His comments come in the wake of a December Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on fraud in the ACA marketplace.  The GAO preliminary report found state and federal marketplaces approved coverage for fictitious applicants who signed up with either false documents or no documents at all from October to December 2024:

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/dr-oz-trump-obamacare-aca-insurance-fraud-deductible-plans-rcna262468

https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-26-108742.pdf

Dr. Oz says Obamacare enrollment may be 'too high'
Even as the top official for Medicaid and Medicare claims millions may be falsely enrolled, the Trump administration is urging younger people to sign up for high-deductible ACA plans.
By Berkeley Lovelace Jr. - March 9, 2026

Although Obamacare sign-ups have fallen significantly this year over skyrocketing monthly premiums, Dr. Mehmet Oz believes enrollment is still too high. Oz, the Trump administration’s top official overseeing the Affordable Care Act, told NBC News that millions of people may be fraudulently enrolled or eligible for other types of coverage.

About 23 million people signed up for ACA coverage during this year’s open enrollment period, which ended in January, according to the latest data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. That’s roughly 1.2 million to 1.3 million fewer sign-ups than last year. ACA coverage typically appeals to people who are self-employed or don’t get coverage through their jobs.

In a phone interview, Oz said some people enrolled in ACA plans should not be there and expects enrollment to fall further — to around 19 million.

“In fact, the fact that we have 23 million makes me think we have too many participants in the ACA,” Oz said. “It’s too high of a number.”

Oz believes some of ACA’s enrollment may stem from fraud in the sign-up process, as well as cases where people were enrolled by mistake, were signed up for duplicate coverage or received tax credits they didn’t qualify for. Others, he said, may qualify for Medicaid or could obtain insurance through a job but instead choose ACA plans.

Last year, the administration said 4 million to 5 million people were “improperly” enrolled in subsidized ACA coverage in 2024, costing U.S. taxpayers up to $20 billion. The administration cited the Paragon Health Institute, a conservative health policy think tank. The administration also pushed for a number of changes to the program, including changes to income verification and a shortened open enrollment period, moves it says are intended to maintain the ACA’s “integrity.”

“Either their income would not qualify them, they made too much or made too little, or they didn’t file the forms, maybe on purpose, or they were duplicately enrolled in Medicaid or more likely other states’ ACAs,” Oz said in the interview. “These are major concerns for us.”

“Fraud, waste and abuse” has been a mantra for Oz, who has claimed that communities in California and Minnesota are tied to health care fraud. Last month, Vice President JD Vance, joined by Oz, announced that the federal government would withhold $259 million in Medicaid funding for people in Minnesota due to concerns about fraud — a claim that Democrats said was politically motivated.

Health policy experts say fraud exists across the entire health care system, but warn that the scale may not be as large as the administration suggests.

“Fraud is a real issue in the ACA marketplace and no one is disputing that,” said Cynthia Cox, director of the program on the ACA at KFF, a nonpartisan health policy research group. She said there are at least a few hundred thousand cases of fraudulent enrollment, not including fraud that may go unnoticed, but probably not millions.

“The scale of it may be overstated at times,” she added.

Richard Frank, a senior fellow in economic studies and director of the Center on Health Policy at ​​the Brookings Institution, a nonpartisan think tank, said it’s likely “implausible” that 4 million to 5 million people, the number cited by the administration, are wrongly enrolled in the ACA.

“Obviously, the number is not zero, it’s not nothing,” Frank said. “But what people are calling fraud are very often just bookkeeping errors.”

The drop in ACA enrollment this year comes after Congress failed to extend the enhanced tax credits that kept premiums lower, leading to double-digit premium increases for millions of Americans. Some experts worried the higher costs would push more people to drop coverage or move to cheaper plans with higher deductibles — something state officials say they are already seeing.

Cheaper monthly bills, higher deductibles

Even as Oz argues that there are millions of Americans who should not be eligible for ACA plans, the administration is taking steps to bring more people into the program.

In February, the administration proposed changes to the ACA marketplace for next year, a move Oz said could bring younger and healthier Americans — people who are currently sitting out of the market and going uninsured — into the system.