Putting Patients First by Strengthening Provider Accountability in FECA Act

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 8823) to amend the Federal Employees Compensation Act to allow the Secretary of Labor to suspend payments to medical providers who have been convicted of fraud, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on H.R. 8823.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 8823, bipartisan legislation that protects both taxpayers and the Federal employees who rely on the Federal Employees' Compensation Act, when they are injured on the job.

Federal workers who are navigating an injury deserve timely, honest, and compassionate care, not to become the target of fraud. Programs like FECA exist to ensure these workers receive the medical treatment and support they need to recover.

Unfortunately, some bad actors have exploited that trust. Instead of following through on the responsibility to care for injured workers, certain medical providers have treated FECA like a personal ATM: submitting fraudulent claims, abusing the system, and enriching themselves at the expense of both taxpayers and the very people they were entrusted to help.

The Office of Inspector General recently testified before Congress that since 2015, it has opened more than 320 criminal investigations involving the FECA program. These investigations have resulted in the indictment and

conviction of 322 individuals and more than $1.7 billion in recovered funds.

This is unacceptable. Every fraudulent claim weakens the program that countless injured Federal employees depend on. Every act of deception undermines confidence in a system that exists to support workers during a difficult moment in their lives.

H.R. 8823 delivers a straightforward, commonsense solution. It codifies existing Department of Labor policy to prevent medical providers who are convicted of defrauding FECA from continuing to receive taxpayer-funded payments through the program. If someone has been found guilty of exploiting injured workers and stealing public funds, they should not continue to profit from the very program they abused.

This legislation sends a clear message, Mr. Speaker: If you cheat taxpayers, exploit injured workers, and abuse the public trust, there will be consequences.

Fraud should have no place in our workers' compensation system. Ambulance-chasing schemes and dishonest providers have taken advantage of this program for far too long. Today, we have the opportunity to put an end to that abuse and reaffirm that these funds are meant to serve injured workers, not line the pockets of fraudsters.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 8823 and tell these scammers that their payday is over.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Mackenzie), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections and the author of this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, families across the Nation carefully budget every dollar they earn to provide for themselves and their loved ones. When they send their tax dollars to Washington, they deserve to know that their hard-earned money is being managed with the same discipline and responsibility.

The American people expect us to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. They work hard, pay their taxes, and deserve to know that those funds are not lining the pockets of fraudsters who exploit the system for personal gain.

Fraud is never a victimless crime. It steals taxpayer dollars and diverts funds away from those they are intended to serve. Every dollar lost to fraud is a dollar that cannot be used to provide legitimate care for injured workers or fulfill commitments we have made to them.

Congress has a responsibility to protect both the integrity of our programs and the taxpayers who fund them. That means ensuring there are real consequences for those who abuse the public's trust and preventing them from continuing to do so. It also means taking commonsense steps to strengthen accountability and safeguard the programs that millions rely upon.

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 8823 does exactly that. It helps ensure that providers who have been convicted of defrauding the Federal Employees' Compensation Act program cannot continue to be allowed to profit from the very program they exploited.

This is a straightforward measure that protects taxpayers, strengthens accountability, and preserves the integrity of an important program for injured Federal workers.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this legislation, stand up for responsible stewardship of taxpayer dollars, and vote ``yes'' on

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 8823, the Putting Patients First By Strengthening Provider Accountability in FECA Act, which I am leading alongside my colleague, Representative Omar.

H.R. 8823 amends the FECA program, or the Federal Employees Compensation Act, to codify the Department of Labor's ability to suspend payments to medical care providers who have been convicted of fraud with respect to this program.

Each year, the FECA program provides benefits to hundreds of thousands of injured Federal workers. This is their system, and they deserve for it to operate efficiently, reliably, and effectively. That requires us to establish commonsense protections against bad actors who would abuse FECA and rip off the Federal workers in the process.

Throughout this year, we have heard numerous concerning reports of providers targeting Federal programs with fraudulent schemes, and FECA is no exception.

As chair of the Workforce Protections Subcommittee, I held a hearing in which we heard from those who testified about fraud costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, money that could have gone toward providing quality care to Federal workers who were injured.

This is unacceptable. Every dollar that goes to a fraudulent provider is one less dollar going toward providing high-quality medical care to an injured Federal worker. That is why when a provider is convicted of fraud, the Department of Labor should have clear authority to shut down the flow of taxpayer dollars that was going into their pockets.

Currently, DOL has the authority to suspend payments to medical providers who are convicted of fraudulent activity. This authority has not been codified and could be rescinded at any time. When it comes to protecting taxpayers and injured workers, our laws must be clear: No dollars should go to fraudulent providers now or at any point in the future.

That is why H.R. 8823 gives DOL the permanent authority to block bad actors from hijacking the system that Federal workers rely on. H.R. 8823 does not aim to restrict access to medical care for our injured Federal employees. Instead, this bill helps ensure that care is only delivered by providers who meet clear standards of professional and ethical conduct.

It is time that we give taxpayers and Federal workers the commonsense, bipartisan protections that they deserve. That is why I urge all of my colleagues to support this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 8823, Putting Patients First by Strengthening Provider Accountability in FECA Act.

Providers are the greatest source of fraud in the Federal Employees' Compensation Act program, otherwise known as FECA. For example, during this committee's oversight of the opioid crisis, we learned about corrupt compounding pharmacies that were crushing up pills and putting them into creams, even though the medicines in those pills were not absorbed through the skin. A 15-ounce tube of this useless cream got charged to the FECA program for $15,000.

Existing rules allow the Department of Labor to strike a provider from the list of eligible providers in the FECA program when they are convicted of fraud in any public health program. Those rules do not enable the Department to stop payment on any claims that a convicted provider has already submitted prior to the conviction. That could amount to millions of dollars in claims with a high risk of fraud moving through the system.

There are, of course, due process issues that could arise, but this bill already contemplates those issues by empowering the Department of Labor to develop appropriate rules for implementing the new authority. All in all, this bill closes an important gap and protects taxpayers.

Mr. Speaker, I am grateful to my colleagues Representatives Omar and Mackenzie on this issue. I urge my colleagues to support this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, this simple, bipartisan bill protects taxpayers. It does so without weakening the FECA program. It simply targets truly bad actors, corrupt physicians, pharmacists, and other providers who exploit injured Federal workers and rip off the FECA program.

This is an example of the kind of reform that makes sense. We are not saving money by turning our backs on the people who need these benefits. Instead, we are focusing the attention where it ought to be, on the providers who profit off workers' pain unlawfully.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I was unable to be present for votes on the legislation being considered under suspension of the rules on July 20, 2026, due to a delayed flight. Had I been present, I would have voted YEA on Roll Call No. 250, H.R. 4541, and YEA on Roll Call No. 251, H.R. 8823.

Mr. Speaker, due to an unforseen conflict, I was unable to cast my vote for H.R. 8823 and H.R. 4541.

Had I been present, I would have voted YEA on Roll Call No. 250 and YEA on Roll Call No. 251.