Obamacare paying out for tens of thousands of dead and bogus accounts: Watchdog
New findings from a congressional watchdog claim that Obamacare’s COVID-19-era subsidies are riddled with errors and that its administrators struggle to shut out fake or incomplete applications.Last week, the Government...
By Fox News · Fox News
New findings from a congressional watchdog claim that Obamacare’s COVID-19-era subsidies are riddled with errors and that its administrators struggle to shut out fake or incomplete applications. Last week, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a nonpartisan agency that examines congressional spending, found that Obamacare is picking up the tab for tens of thousands of accounts, using enhanced premium tax credits (APTCs) to pay for more than one coverage plan, deceased account holders and applicants lacking identifying information. SENATE DEMOCRATS PUSH OBAMACARE SUBSIDY VOTE 'DESIGNED TO FAIL' AS REPUBLICANS CALL PLAN UNSERIOUS "GAO's preliminary analyses identified over 29,000 SSNs (Social Security numbers) in 2023 and nearly 68,000 SSNs in 2024 used to receive more than one year's worth of insurance coverage with APTC in a single plan year," the report read. In addition to the evaluation of real-world fraud, the GAO also created several fake accounts to see if Obamacare would prevent them from receiving benefits. "Of 20 fictitious applicants, 18 remain actively covered as of September 2025. APTC for these 18 enrollees totals over $10,000 per month. GAO continues to monitor the enrollments as part of its ongoing work," the GAO said. The GAO stressed that its findings "cannot be generalized to the enrollee population." Notably, the fraud detected accounts for less than 1% of all of Obamacare’s users. GAO’s findings come as lawmakers wrestle with whether to extend the enhanced premium subsidies for Obamacare set to expire at the end of the year that were first passed to help policyholders pay for health insurance during the COVID-19 pandemic. Without them, Democrats fear that the vast majority of Obamacare policyholders — over 90% of the program’s 24 million enrollees — could find themselves suddenly stuck with significantly higher premiums overnight. Republicans remain split on whether lawmakers should extend the subsidies in some way. The fiscally conservati…