Trump's Rollback of Rules for Mental Health Coverage Could Lead More Americans to Go Without Care

Trump’s Rollback of Rules for Mental Health Coverage Could Lead More Americans to Go Without Care
The president, who has framed mental health as a national crisis, paused rules to hold insurers accountable for unlawfully denying coverage. And Congress cut funding to the agency that enforces insurers’ equal treatment of mental and physical health.

by Maya Miller and Jeremy Kohler
Aug. 18, 2025, 5 a.m. EDT


(ProPublica) During his first term, President Donald Trump frequently turned to the issue of mental health, framing it as a national crisis that demanded action. He linked it to opioid addiction, mass shootings and a surge in veteran suicides — and he later used it to argue against COVID-19 lockdowns and school closures.

At times, he backed up his rhetoric with action. His administration issued tens of millions of dollars in grants to expand community mental health services and continued funding contracts to help federal regulators enforce the parity law, which requires insurers to treat mental and physical health care equally.

But just months after Trump returned to the presidency this year, his administration paused new rules issued in President Joe Biden’s final months that were designed to strengthen mental health protections and hold insurance companies accountable when they unlawfully denied coverage. That pause came after an industry group that advocates for large employers on issues related to employee benefits filed a lawsuit seeking to block the new rules.

What’s more, Congress has curtailed funding for the Employee Benefits Security Administration, or EBSA, a small agency in the Department of Labor that enforces mental health parity in most employer-sponsored health insurance plans. The squeeze is largely due to the expiration of temporary supplemental funding Congress approved just weeks after Biden was elected president but before he took office. .................(more)

https://www.propublica.org/article/mental-health-insurance-trump-rules