President Trump and Congressional Republicans Must Fully Embrace the Medicare Price Negotiation Program
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced the 15 drugs it has selected for the third year of Medicare price negotiation, which was passed into law by congressional Democrats and President Biden in 2022.
The list of drugs selected for price negotiation represent $27 billion in annual Medicare spending and includes treatments for multiple forms of cancer, type 2 diabetes, HIV, rheumatoid arthritis and other conditions.
President Trump and congressional Republicans’ “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” included language to exempt and delay negotiations for drugs that would have otherwise been selected for negotiations this year, including Keytruda, Darzalex and Opdivo. These exemptions are projected to reduce savings from the negotiation program by $8.8 billion or more.
Public Citizen’s Access to Medicines advocate, Steve Knievel issued the following statement.
“It is past time that President Trump and congressional Republicans fully embrace the Medicare Drug Price Negotiation Program.
“Negotiators at CMS made laudable progress by securing even deeper savings on drug prices negotiated in 2025 than in the first year of the program. Price negotiations on the next 15 drugs announced today will extend the reach of the program to more treatments and more patients, but President Trump and Republicans’ Big Ugly Bill included language to undermine the program by further delaying negotiations for some drugs and exempting others entirely. Now, cancer patients and taxpayers will pay billions more as a result.
“President Trump and his allies in Congress should stop attacking price negotiations and instead join with congressional Democrats to bring down the prices of more drugs, for more patients, sooner.”