NEW YORK (AP) — The Trump administration will require all 50 states to explain their plans to revalidate some of their Medicaid providers in a national escalation of anti-fraud efforts that have so far largely focused on specific states, Dr. Mehmet Oz said Tuesday.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Administrator said during a Politico health care summit that his agency plans to ask states to “own” the problem of health care fraud this week with requests for states to share their strategies within 30 days.
“It's an example of what we'd like them to do to prove that they're serious about this,” Oz said onstage Tuesday. “And if you don't take it seriously, it indicates to us that we might have to take the audits that we're doing to the different states more aggressively,” he said, without elaborating.
Tuesday's announcement is part of a federal campaign to tackle waste, fraud and abuse in federal Medicaid and Medicare programs that so far has mostly targeted Democratic states — and at least once has erred in its accusations.
Earlier this month, The Associated Press reported that CMS made a significant error in figures it used to help justify a fraud probe in New York. The acknowledgment deepened doubts in the administration's methods and raised a common criticism that has been made about the second Trump administration — that it tends to attack first and confirm the facts later.
In addition to New York, CMS has approached at least four other states with investigations into potential health care fraud and halted some $243 million in Medicaid payments to one of them, Minnesota, over fraud concerns. It also is blocking for six months any new Medicare enrollments for suppliers of durable medical equipment, prosthetics, orthotics or certain other supplies around the country to address the potential for fraud. In addition, federal officials made several arrests earlier this month related to alleged hospice fraud schemes in the Los Angeles area.
Last month, Trump signed an executive order to create an anti-fraud task force across federal benefit programs led by Vice President JD Vance. It's unclear whether Tuesday's move is part of that effort, though Oz has been working closely with Vance on other investigations related to the task force. Asked for details on the new audit, a spokesperson for CMS said the agency was researching the AP's inquiry.
Oz justified Tuesday's move by saying federal health programs in some states have enrolled large numbers of providers who aren't providing real care to patients, but instead profiting from fraud. He said the requests for states to verify the legitimacy of Medicaid providers will be focused on “high risk areas,” but didn’t explain what those entail.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who the Trump administration and congressional Republicans have blamed for allowing fraud to happen in federally funded programs including Medicaid, welcomed Oz’s announcement.
Walz told reporters Tuesday that Minnesota hadn’t received the request yet, but the Democratic governor said his state is already moving ahead with the revalidation process and has made significant improvements. Minnesota sued CMS in February in an attempt to stop it from withholding Medicaid funds. That case is still ongoing, and the money has not yet been released, but CMS wrote to state officials last month that the agency had approved the state’s corrective action plan.
Asked during the Politico interview whether there was a risk that Trump administration initiatives could eliminate, slow down or harm essential health care programs, Oz said he expects the opposite. He said Medicaid and Medicare are the “crown jewels” of our nation.
“I believe this audit and others like it will save the programs we care most about,” he said.
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Associated Press writer Steve Karnowski in St. Paul, Minnesota, contributed to this report.
FILE - Administrator for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Dr. Mehmet Oz speaks during a news conference on efforts to combat fraud, in the Old Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House campus Feb. 25, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks and oil prices flip-flopped Tuesday as uncertainty rose about what will happen following a two-week ceasefire in the war with Iran, which is set to expire Wednesday.
The S&P 500 erased an early rise to fall 0.2% after U.S. Vice President JD Vance called off a trip to Pakistan, where he was expected to lead U.S. negotiators in talks with Iran to extend the ceasefire. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 148 points, or 0.3%, after erasing an earlier rise of 400 points, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.1% lower, with less than an hour remaining in trading.
Oil prices also wavered, with the price for a barrel of Brent crude going from less than $95 to nearly $100 through the day. It settled at $98.48, up 3.1%, and then dipped back below $98.
The moves were mostly more modest than the vicious swings that rocked Wall Street earlier in the war, when the price for a barrel of Brent crude briefly topped $119 and the S&P 500 dropped nearly 10% below its prior all-time high. The U.S. stock market remains near its most recent record, which was set Friday, indicating optimism still remains in financial markets that the United States and Iran will avoid a worst-case scenario for the economy.
UnitedHealth Group and other big companies also showed they’re making even bigger profits than analysts expected, which helped support the market.
UnitedHealth jumped 7.6% after also raising its forecast for profit over the full year of 2026. That’s big because stock prices tend to follow the path of corporate profits over the long term. It’s a double-plus for investors when companies not only top earnings estimates but also forecast even better growth ahead.
Quest Diagnostics rose 6% after reporting fatter profit for the latest quarter while also raising its profit forecast for the full year.
They worked against a 12.9% drop for Tractor Supply, whose profit and revenue for the latest quarter fell short of expectations.
Other signals are also indicating the U.S. economy may be doing OK despite sharp up-and-down swings for oil prices because of the war with Iran. A report on Tuesday morning showed that U.S. retailers made more money in March, the first full month of the war, than analysts expected.
Growth was even relatively stable for retail sales when not including those from gasoline stations.
“It’s become cliched to say that the economic hit will depend on the duration of the Middle East conflict, but that cliché does ring true,” according to Brian Jacobsen, chief economic strategist at Annex Wealth Management.
Much of the tension in financial markets has focused on what will happen to the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway off Iran’s coast that oil tankers use to exit the Persian Gulf. A long-term closure would keep crude oil pent up in the gulf and away from customers worldwide.
On Wall Street, Apple fell 1.9% after Tim Cook said he’ll step down as CEO on Sept. 1 and become the iPhone maker’s executive chairman. He’s handing control over to John Ternus, a company veteran who rose through Apple's hardware engineering ranks.
Amazon rose 1.2% after Anthropic said it signed a new agreement and is committing more than $100 billion over the next 10 years to AWS technologies to train and run its Claude chatbot.
In stock markets abroad, indexes fell in Europe following a stronger finish in Asia. South Korea’s Kospi rose 2.7% for one of the world’s biggest moves.
In the bond market, Treasury yields rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury climbed to 4.28% from 4.26% late Monday.
Kevin Warsh, President Donald Trump's nominee to chair the Federal Reserve, said that he never promised Trump he would cut interest rates, even though Trump has consistently called for the central bank to do so.
He's facing a tightrope walk, as investors want him to maintain the Fed's independence from political meddling.
AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed to this report.
Specialist James Denaro works at his post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Monday, April 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
A dealer walks past the screen showing the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at a dealing room of Hana Bank in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
A dealer walks past the screens showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at a dealing room of Hana Bank in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
A dealer watches computer monitors at a dealing room of Hana Bank in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
A dealer stands near the screens showing the foreign exchange rates at a dealing room of Hana Bank in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
A dealer walks past the screens showing the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at a dealing room of Hana Bank in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, April 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
Trader Michael Milano, left, works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Monday, April 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
