Federal Bill of the Month – April 2026: H.R. 8293 – Abolish the CMMI Act

Introduced by Rep. Aaron Bean (R-Fl.), H.R. 8293—the Abolish the CMMI Act—would be a welcome step toward fiscal responsibility and consumer choice in healthcare. According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) has cost taxpayers $11.4 billion since its inception in 2010. While the agency was created to test and implement innovative healthcare payment and service delivery models, it has abysmally failed. In the last decade, CMMI has launched over 50 model tests. Of these model tests, only six have generated statistically significant savings for Medicare and, by extension, taxpayers. 

CMMI was originally intended for small-scale healthcare payment reforms but has evolved into a tool for implementing national healthcare policies without Congressional approval. And now, it is being used to implement onerous price controls on medications. In December, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced a pair of new mandatory payment models that bear a troubling resemblance to President Trump’s Most Favored Nation (MFN) approach to price-fixing drugs.

Echoing the President’s Executive Order, the Global Benchmark for Efficient Drug Pricing (GLOBE) and Guarding U.S. Medicare Against Rising Drug Costs (GUARD) models tie the prices of drugs payable under Medicare Parts B and D to those in foreign countries with socialized healthcare systems. Using CMMI to “test” models certain to cause drug shortages is simply a terrible use of taxpayer dollars.

Rep. Bean’s bill would spare taxpayers from reckless federal spending—while ensuring that consumers are not subject to heavy-handed price controls. For these reasons, the Taxpayers Protection Alliance is pleased to make H.R. 8293 its Federal Bill of the Month for April 2026.

The Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) released a series of issue briefs for the 115^th Congress titled Roadmap to Fiscal Sanity.  The publication puts forward an aggressive reform agenda for Congress.

The publication focuses on 14 different policy areas where reform is needed to help reduce the size of government, cut spending, enact tax reform, and help get the economy back on track.  Issues covered in the publication include Defense Spending, Earmarks, Energy, Health Care, Intellectual Property, Mergers, Regulatory Reform, Solar Subsidies, Tax Reform, Telecommunications Policy, Trade Policy, United Nations/World Health Organization and United States Postal Service Reform.

TPA President David Williams said of the release, “The newly elected Congress has No More Excuses for not acting on real and meaningful reform when it comes to reducing spending and getting the debt under control. TPA’s Roadmap to Fiscal Sanity provides a path forward.” Williams also said the report shows why taxpayers are so frustrated with Washington, “The problems we identify in this brief are areas where TPA has been working on reform for years and while Congress has made many promises, they have failed to deliver. Our report can help make those promises a reality which will benefit all taxpayers and working families.”

Williams concluded by urging lawmakers to take the report and the concerns of taxpayers seriously, “It’s clear from the 2016 election results that taxpayers are fed up with Washington. They’ve been ignoring the concerns of the American people for far too long and that has to change. The Roadmap to Fiscal Sanity is a way for Congress to not only take those concerns more seriously, but also a way to finally put forward meaningful solutions that will get the country back on a positive economic track, while reducing the massive debt that the nation continues to accumulate.”