RFK Jr. rolls back transparency policy on Medicaid and NIH changes

from CBS

RFK Jr. aims to shut down public comment practice after promising a “new era of radical transparency.”

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ended a longstanding transparency rule on Friday, supercharging his authority to change policies in areas ranging from Medicaid to the National Institutes of Health without advance notice to the public.

Dubbed the "Richardson Waiver" after the former health secretary who issued the rule in 1971, the policy Kennedy repealed had required regulations related to property, loans, grants, benefits or contracts to go through the federal "rulemaking" process.

The law governing rulemaking usually exempts such regulations, but in response to calls at the time to close the exemption, officials voluntarily waived it. This meant that, until now, they would go through the process of notifying the public of their proposals and asking for comments before imposing changes. 

"The extra-statutory obligations of the Richardson Waiver impose costs on the Department and the public, are contrary to the efficient operation of the Department, and impede the Department's flexibility to adapt quickly to legal and policy mandates," Kennedy said in a filing announcing the end of the waiver.

Now health agencies no longer need to go through the notice and comment process for many policy changes about grants and benefits. This includes new rules that could otherwise be stymied by backlash during a public comment period, like potentially adding in work requirements to Medicaid or redrawing how the National Institutes of Health funds research...

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