The Trump administration is pausing more than $1 billion in Medicaid payments to California and Minnesota due to “suspected fraud and noncompliance,” U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a Tuesday press conference.
More than $867 million will be deferred from California and more than $200 million from Minnesota, according to Kennedy.
“If those states want that money, they need to provide documentation that these payments are legitimate,” he said.
U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) had already announced in May that $1.3 billion would be held from California, which CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz, M.D., said was the largest deferral ever made by the agency. Similar actions were announced against Minnesota in February.
This is a developing story and will be updated with more information.