“These companies have built entire businesses around making beneficiaries look as sick as possible,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren. “And unsurprisingly, government watchdogs have discovered widespread abuse.”

In the wake of numerous studies and investigations detailing the staggering level of fraud in the privately run Medicare Advantage program, the Biden administration proposed a new rule aimed at cracking down on upcoding—a common industry practice whereby plans describe patients as sicker than they actually are to reap larger payments from the federal government.

The rule, finalized by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) earlier this year, sparked a furious lobbying blitz that has only intensified in recent weeks, with the for-profit insurance industry’s most powerful players leading the fight against the proposal and other policy changes that they have falsely characterized as Medicare Advantage “cuts.”

The New York Times reported Wednesday that insurance industry executives and lobbyists have been “flooding Capitol Hill” in an effort to protect their