Lia DeGroot and Jessie Hellmann | (TNS) CQ-Roll Call WASHINGTON — The future of one of President Joe Biden’s key domestic policy achievements –– getting Medicare to negotiate drug prices –– could either become part of the Biden administration’s legacy, get rolled back by the incoming Congress or be weakened by President-elect Donald Trump’s administration. Trump has remained relatively mum about the drug pricing provisions of the 2022 reconciliation bill and its future appears even murkier now that Republicans will control both the House and Senate. “The Trump campaign articulated no position on drug price negotiation specifically, but congressional Republicans are not fans of this program and introduced legislation to repeal the IRA in its entirety,” said Juliette Cubanski, deputy director of the program on Medicare policy at KFF, a health research organization, referring to the law by its nickname, an abbreviation for the Inflation Reduction Act.
Trump will find himself responsible for administering the program after the Jan. 20 inauguration. While he supported Medicare price negotiation in the past, it’s unclear where he stands on the issue now.
His campaign backed off a similar proposal that would tie drug prices paid in the U.S. to prices paid by other countries.
Medicare drug price negotiation passed as part of the 2022 reconciliation bill, allowing the administration to negotiate with drug companies on the prices of 10 high-priced drugs beginning .