Editorial note: The Read on Washington is a monthly column on happenings in DC that affect the field of health services research. In addition, AcademyHealth recently began offering ad hoc updates via the Situation Report series. The Situation Report can be found on our blog and is also emailed directly to our members. All of AcademyHealth’s advocacy work is supported by member dues.
AcademyHealth joins lawsuit to restore public health data removed from federal websites
In response to the sweeping removal of public health information from federal websites, AcademyHealth announced that it has joined a federal lawsuit seeking to restore access to critical data removed by the Trump Administration. Over the past several months, the administration has directed the deletion of thousands of webpages from federal agencies, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The missing content includes essential information on LGBTQ health, gender and reproductive issues, clinical trials, vaccine guidance, and HIV/AIDS research. “We can’t afford to stand on the sidelines while the foundation of evidence-based research—open, public data—is quietly dismantled,” said Dr. Aaron Carroll, president and CEO of AcademyHealth. “Access to trustworthy information allows us to solve real problems, improve health outcomes, and plan for the future. If we don’t stand up for data now, we risk losing the tools we rely on to make progress, regardless of politics.”
House passes bill to slash Medicaid
On a party line vote, House Republicans passed through the chamber the budget reconciliation bill that extends trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the ultrawealthy while slashing Medicaid for beneficiaries. Once the dust settled, the bill took a tougher approach on work requirements. Instead of work requirements taking effect in January 2029, they would start Dec. 31, 2026. It would be the first time work requirements are a federal requirement. They apply to able-bodied adults and mandate 80 hours of work per month. This bill is expected to remove over 14 million people from Medicaid coverage. As Dr. Carroll noted in a February 2025 editorial in the New York Times, most Medicaid recipients who can work, do. Evidence indicates that rather incentivizing employment, work requirements introduce unnecessary bureaucracy that ultimately removes eligible individuals. Groups representing the nation's health systems like the Federation of American Hospitals, the Catholic Health Association and America’s Essential Hospitals also opposed the bill in its current form.
New polling shows opposition to cuts in research funding
According to a poll from Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos that was released late last month, 77 percent of Americans oppose the Trump Administration reducing funding for medical research. Additionally, 70 percent have opposed an increased federal role in how private universities operate.
LGBTQ+ researchers sue HHS, NIH over grant cuts
A group of physicians and researchers working on LGBTQ+ health sued the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Health and Human Services over the sweeping grant terminations that have impacted medical research on queer people as part of the implementation of President Trump’s executive orders targeting transgender people and diversity initiatives. It’s the latest in a series of lawsuits against the federal health agency since the Trump administration began its overhaul, and the second to specifically focus on how research cuts have affected LGBTQ+ research. Another group of researchers, including Brittany Charlton of the Harvard T.H. Chan School’s LGBTQ Health Center of Excellence, sued in mid-May.
Secretary Kennedy testifies on HHS budgets amid impoundments
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been testifying before House and Senate Committees about the FY26 proposed budget and the cuts that the Administration has unilaterally made to the workforce, federal programming, and grants. These hearings have been highly contentious as Congress seeks answers about the authority that Kennedy used to fire tens of thousands of HHS employees and cut billions of dollars in federal grants.
CMS closing Civil Rights Office
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will close its civil rights office in June. The office closure is part of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s mass reorganization of his department that has seen the agency downsized by roughly 20 percent. Kennedy and President Donald Trump have also focused on programs and agencies they say promote diversity, equity and inclusion. CMS’ Office of Equal Opportunity and Civil Rights develops civil rights compliance policy for CMS workers and advises agency leadership on the promotion of those rights.
What we’re reading
Over the past several weeks, the Trump Administration has cut science and education grants that were providing opportunities for deaf and hard-of-hearing students to enter the scientific workforce. These include programs for training teachers of the deaf, scholarships, mentorship programs, sign language interpretation, stipends for research supplies and travel to professional conferences.
The National Cancer Institute published in Health Services Research a description of 10 leading trends in cancer health services research, including: “(1) precision oncology; (2) whole-person perspectives; (3) health technologies (e.g., artificial intelligence (AI), mobile health, telehealth); (4) expanding in-home and community-based services; (5) health system integration and efforts addressing care fragmentation; (6) workforce capacity and evolving roles; (7) population aging; (8) improving safety, quality, value and access while controlling costs and addressing financial toxicity; (9) addressing social drivers of health; and (10) leveraging data oceans with unstructured, semi-structured, and structured elements.” With recent reorganizations within HHS, healthcare and research funding reductions and freezes, and the recent reduction in data accessibility, each of these topics is at risk. Innovations in healthcare ranging from targeted biomedical therapies to community-institution partnerships rely on reliable, accessible data for both immediate action and long-term sustainability.
As congressional Republicans move closer to cutting Medicaid, Roberts et al wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine about the predicted impact of losing the Low-Income Subsidy (LIS), which helps cover prescription drug costs for low-income Medicare beneficiaries, following Medicaid disenrollment. Using Medicare data from 2015–2023, researchers found that earlier Medicaid disenrollment—leading to a shorter duration of LIS coverage—was associated with higher mortality. Specifically, those who lost LIS sooner had 3 more deaths per 1,000 people within 17 months compared to those who retained it longer, with even greater mortality seen among individuals with high drug spending or chronic conditions. The findings suggest that loss of drug subsidies can negatively affect survival among vulnerable populations, findings that may be inevitable if the proposed Medicaid cuts are realized.