THIS WEEK’S DOSE

• Key Nominations Move Forward. Having advanced from the Senate Finance Committee this week, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination for secretary of Health & Human Services will now go to the Senate floor.
• Pathway on Reconciliation Is Uncertain. While the House Budget Committee was expected to start the reconciliation process this week with a markup of a budget resolution, that did not happen.
• House Energy & Commerce Health Subcommittee Holds Hearing on Drug Threats. Members examined solutions to the opioid crisis.
• Trump Issues EO Modifying the Regulatory Process. The executive order (EO) calls for fewer regulations and rescinds changes to the regulatory cost-benefit analysis.
• Administration Modifies Public Health Data. The Centers for Disease Control & Prevention scrubbed its websites of mentions of gender identity and diversity, equity, and inclusion.
• Legal Challenges Continue in Response to Trump Administration Actions. Federal judges have taken additional actions to block efforts to freeze certain federal funding, and a lawsuit was filed in response to a Trump EO on care for transgender youth.

CONGRESS

Key Nominations Move Forward. The Senate Finance Committee advanced Robert F. Kennedy (RFK) Jr.’s nomination to lead the US Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) in a 14 – 13 vote along party lines. The nomination now moves to the Senate floor. If every Democrat opposes the nomination in the floor vote, RFK Jr. could lose up to three Republican votes and still be confirmed as HHS secretary.

The Senate confirmed Russell Vought as director of the Office of Management & Budget (OMB) by a 53 – 47 vote. The Senate voted to confirm Doug Collins to lead the US Department of Veterans Affairs in a vote of 77 – 23. Dr. Mehmet Oz, President Trump’s nominee to lead the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), began meeting with senators on Capitol Hill this week, the first step in his nomination process. He has not spoken publicly on Medicaid much before, but he was quoted this week as saying, “We have to take care of the most vulnerable among us. It’s a social calling for all of us . . . that funding freeze was not designed to affect Medicaid at all.”

Pathway on Reconciliation Is Uncertain. While the House was expected to start the reconciliation process with a markup of a budget resolution in the Budget Committee this week, that did not happen. House Republicans continue to negotiate with one another about the level of spending cuts and held a meeting at the White House with President Trump, after which they announced they were moving closer to an agreement. Because this will be a partisan process, Republicans need to be largely unified in order to proceed. During this uncertainty, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) made it clear that the Senate is prepared to move forward with its own budget resolution, which would begin a two-bill approach to reconciliation, with an immigration, energy, and defense bill completed first and a tax bill tackled later in the year. Senate Republicans are set to meet with President Trump Friday night at Mar-a-Lago to promote this approach. The budget resolution is a necessary first step in the reconciliation process, and healthcare programs are expected to be on the table for spending cuts. For an overview on the budget reconciliation process and its impact on health policies, read our +Insight.

House Energy & Commerce Health Subcommittee Holds Hearing on Drug Threats. The hearing discussed the importance of expanding access to addiction and mental health services and ensuring wide availability of Narcan. Republican members primarily focused on the importance of border security in combatting the opioid crisis, and Democratic members emphasized the funding freeze’s adverse impacts on medical research and the critical roles that Medicaid and federally qualified health centers play in enabling access to care for substance use disorders.

ADMINISTRATION

Trump Issues EO Modifying the Regulatory Process. This EO requires that whenever an agency promulgates a new rule, regulation, or guidance, it must identify at least 10 existing rules, regulations, or guidance documents to be repealed. The EO tasks the director of OMB with ensuring standardized measurement and estimation of regulatory costs, and it requires that, for fiscal year 2025, the total incremental cost of all new regulations, including repealed regulations, be significantly less than zero. It is unclear what this 10 – 1 ratio means in practice or how it will be implemented.

Administration Modifies Public Health Data. To comply with President Trump’s EOs related to gender identity and diversity, equity, and inclusion, the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention first removed, then uploaded a modified version of, public information and data related to HIV and health information for teens and LGBTQ+ people on both its data directory and main webpage. In response, a medical advocacy group has sued multiple health agencies, stating that the removal of data deprives physicians and researchers of access to necessary information.

COURTS

Legal Challenges Continue in Response to Trump Administration Actions. Following legal challenges last week to the Trump administration’s now-rescinded OMB memo directing agencies to freeze certain federal funding, more federal judges have acted to halt the federal freeze. On January 31, a federal judge in Rhode Island granted a temporary restraining order to block the freeze, following a lawsuit from Democratic attorneys general from 22 states and the District of Columbia. On February 3, a federal judge in the District of Columbia issued a similar injunction in a lawsuit filed by several coalitions of nonprofits. 

PFLAG National, GLMA, and transgender individuals and their families filed a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration’s EO “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation.” The EO states that federal agencies shall not “fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called ‘transition’ of a child from one sex to another.” Plaintiffs in the lawsuit, filed in the US District Court for the District of Maryland, argue that the EO will create harm by denying access to physician-prescribed, medically recommended care. Read the press release here.

In response to a lawsuit brought by unions representing federal workers, a federal judge in Massachusetts paused the deadline for the administration’s buyout program for federal workers. There is another hearing set for next week.

QUICK HITS

• HHS OCR Announces Action on Anti-Semitism. The HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) will initiate compliance reviews related to reported incidents of anti-Semitism at four medical schools.
• House Democratic Leaders Send Letter to GAO on Medicare Drug Price Negotiation. In the letter, Energy & Commerce Ranking Member Frank Pallone (D-NJ), Ways & Means Ranking Member Richard Neal (D-MA), and Education & Workforce Ranking Member Bobby Scott (D-VA) urged the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) to monitor the Medicare Drug Price Negotiation Program to ensure the Trump administration complies with the Inflation Reduction Act, which directed and authorized the GAO to conduct oversight of the program.
• CMS Releases Statement on DOGE Collaboration. The short statement notes that two senior CMS officials are working with Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

NEXT WEEK’S DIAGNOSIS

Both chambers will be in session next week. The House Veterans’ Affairs Health Subcommittee will hold another hearing on community care, the House Ways & Means Health Subcommittee will hold a hearing on modernizing healthcare, and the Senate Special Committee on Aging will hold a hearing on optimizing longevity. As noted, the House Budget Committee may mark up a budget resolution that would start the budget reconciliation process, or the Senate could move first. The full Senate is on track to approve RFK Jr.’s nomination, and we expect the administration to continue taking executive action related to healthcare.