Funding for Obamacare Outreach Program Cut by 90 Percent

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The Affordable Care Act navigator program will now receive $10 million per year. Last year, it received $98 million.

The Trump administration on Feb. 14 cut funding for an outreach program under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that helps people sign up for health insurance coverage, according to a statement from the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS).

The agency said in a statement that ACA navigators will receive $10 million per year over the next four years. In 2024, the navigator program received $98 million, according to the agency. The ACA, passed in 2010, is a sweeping health care plan known as Obamacare.

CMS stated it was a cost-cutting move that would allow for health care exchanges to focus on more efficient strategies.

โ€œOverall, navigator performance data shows that the current level of funding does not represent a reasonable return on investment,โ€œ CMS officials said. โ€These numbers indicate that navigators are not enrolling nearly enough people to justify the substantial amount of federal dollars previously spent on the program.โ€

In 2024, the navigators enrolled 92,000 consumers, which is โ€œjust 0.6 percent of plan selections through the [federally facilitated exchanges] during the open enrollment period … at a cost of $1,061 per enrollment.โ€

โ€œAdditionally, the average cost per enrollment exceeded $3,000 for 12 of the 56 navigator grantee organizations. Looking back at the grant period covering the 2019 plan yearโ€”the year before the COVID-19 pandemic under a similar regulatory approachโ€”navigators likewise enrolled 0.6 percent of total enrollments through the FFEs at a substantially lower cost of $10 million,โ€ the statement said.

In response to the CMS announcement, Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Fla.) criticized in a statement that the funding cut was โ€œa direct attack on the health, well-being, and pocketbooks of communities acrossโ€ her district.

A nonprofit called Protect Our Care noted in a statement Friday that the first Trump administration also cut funding for the Obamacare navigator program, which it said led to more than 1 million people not being signed up for coverage.

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