WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Monday announced more than 600 generic medications are being added to the government’s discounted-drug website TrumpRx, dramatically increasing offerings from one of the Republican administration’s key initiatives to help Americans struggling with high costs.
The beefed-up website is the Trump administration’s answer to criticism from Democrats who have called TrumpRx performative and noted that many of the brand-name drugs it has featured are cheaper with insurance or have lower-cost generic versions sold elsewhere.
It also marks an effort to respond to a top voter concern for November’s midterm elections: affordability. Health costs are a worry for many Americans, an issue compounded by the Republican-led Congress’ recent cuts to Medicaid and the expiration of enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies this year that sent some people’s premiums skyrocketing.
The expansion is made possible by partnerships with other online pharmacies, including Amazon Pharmacy, GoodRx and billionaire investor Mark Cuban’s Cost Plus Drugs, Trump said at an event at the White House.
“’This has been the greatest breakthrough in lowering health care costs in modern history, but we’re just sort of getting started,” Trump said, calling TrumpRx the “hottest thing in medicine.”
TrumpRx is not a platform for buying medications. Instead, it’s set up as a facilitator, pointing Americans to drugmakers’ direct-to-consumer websites, where they can make purchases. It also provides coupons to use at pharmacies. The site initially launched in February with over 40 medications, including weight-loss drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy.
Trump said Monday’s additions increase the site’s offerings by nearly seven times. He said TrumpRx has been visited more than 10 million times since its launch.
Even with generics added, experts said the potential savings heavily depend on a patient’s situation. For the vast majority of Americans who have health insurance, using that coverage to pay for medications is still usually a better deal than paying cash through TrumpRx, said Rena Conti, a professor at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business.
People who are uninsured or have a high deductible to meet, on the other hand, might benefit more from discounts on sites like TrumpRx, she said. She noted the addition of generics would likely provide more options for those shopping the website.
Cuban, a political independent, publicly campaigned for Democrat Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election. But he has enthusiastically advocated for TrumpRx and the work that some in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services are doing to make prescription drugs cheaper.
Before Monday, Cuban had said the one thing Trump could do to make the government’s version better would be to add the drugs available on his own site.
“Everyone wants me to rip on TrumpRx,” Cuban wrote in a recent social media post. “Reality is, it’s saving patients money on IVF and a few other drugs. A lot of money.”
Though they’ve sparred in the past, Trump and Cuban were congenial at Monday’s event.
“We have the same thing, one thing in common: We want to make people better and keep them wealthy,” Trump said of himself and Cuban.
Besides TrumpRx, the administration has promoted other efforts to lower drug costs, including deals between the president and the 17 major drugmakers to offer medications at the same prices that appear in other developed countries, or lower.
The details of those deals have not been made public and have prompted scrutiny from lawmakers of both parties who say they want to review the contracts.
___
Swenson reported from New York.
