Trump admin shortens ACA enrollment window

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Axios

11 hours ago


The Trump administration on Friday narrowed the period to sign up for Affordable Care Act coverage and imposed other restrictions aimed at rolling back Biden-era flexibilities for the program.

Why it matters: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services expects the new policies to lower marketplace premiums by about 5% on average, and save taxpayers $12 billion next year.

But between 725,000 and 1.8 million people are expected to lose coverage, per CMS's projections.

The big picture: Congress is considering codifying many of the same provisions in the massive GOP budget bill that's now in the Senate. That would make them much harder for a future administration to undo.

State of play: CMS is shortening the period for enrolling in marketplace insurance by two weeks, starting for plan year 2027. Federal exchanges will then be open for sign-ups from Nov. 1 through Dec. 31 of each year.

It's also repealing the monthly opportunity started under the Biden administration for lower-income people to get marketplace coverage.

The new rule limits plans' ability to cover gender-affirming care beginning next year.

It also excludes Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients from obtaining ACA coverage.

Read more: https://www.axios.com/2025/06/20/trump-admin-aca-coverage-changes

[Blues Heron]

1. why is there a window at all? You should be able to get it when you need it.

[BumRushDaShow]

2. I think in general

unless you have a "change" in personal status, e.g., "life change" like getting married and/or having children, or you are starting/changing/retiring from a job, then health insurance enrollment has a general "period" when people can join or change their existing coverage, and that is usually during the fall.

I know in the federal government, the FEHB (Federal Employees Health Benefits) has an "open season" time frame that usually starts around early October and ends near the end of November.

But for the ACA, I think there was generally a wider "open season" period, probably due to accounting for some states that had their own exchanges and if not, everyone else needing to use the federal exchange.

[tonekat]

4. Yes the "Special Enrollment period"

There's a list of the events that trigger it on Healthcare.gov.

Native Americans can enroll any time of year if they belong to a federally recognized tribe.

Unfortunately the federally-funded Marketplaces have had their funding cut drastically by the FELON47 admin., so they will be hobbled as far as hiring and maintaining their staff and conducting outreach and enrollment. All by design of the evil people.

[BumRushDaShow]

5. And unfortunately

you have people like Kathleen Sebilius forced to resign as HHS Secretary due to the rollout issues of the ACA, which eventually prompted creation of what got dubbed "18F", that served as a specialized IT web services team to ensure the quality of sites like "healthcare.gov", and other large government websites.

However that little group has since been "deleted" by Muskrat's DOGE.

So will the same demands to resign happen to brainworm host? I won't count on it.

[IbogaProject]

6. It is more the window to switch plans

But other limits to signing up the rest of the year will have negative impacts. There was supposed to be a penalty for idiots like Mary Lou Retton who skipped insurance until she caught "a rare pneumonia" (likely severe COVID). This is all so stupid, we just need to cover every one all the time and figure out how to make the wealthy carry the cost, since they benefit from the economy growing the most.

[Wicked Blue]

3. Open enrollment will ultimately be between 4:15 am and 4:20 am on December 24