Texas Democrat Rep. Greg Casar sought to pressure Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. during a House Education and Workforce Committee hearing on Friday, demanding confirmation whether Kennedy had personally met with any of the 1.4 million Americans who reportedly lost health insurance coverage over the past year.

Kennedy responded sharply: “They’re almost all illegal immigrants. We found 1.5 million illegal immigrants illegally collecting Medicaid.”

The revelation stunned Casar’s approach, which assumed healthcare losses resulted from Republican policies harming legitimate citizens. Kennedy instead asserted these individuals were never authorized for federal health coverage in the first place.

Kennedy further detailed that nearly a million people simultaneously claimed Medicaid across multiple states—a practice he called “illegal” and “theft.” He criticized the Biden administration’s handling of fraud, stating it had directed Health and Human Services (HHS) to halt all program integrity activities. Kennedy also noted HHS estimates annual fraud in entitlement programs costs taxpayers approximately $100 billion, adding that ending fraud in Medicare alone could extend the program by five years.

Under Kennedy’s leadership, HHS has ended the previous administration’s “pay and chase” system—where fraudulent claims were paid first before recovery attempts—replacing it with an AI-driven “detect and deploy” strategy. The agency has also shut down 500 fraudulent hospices in Los Angeles alone. Kennedy testified that under prior Biden-era policies, 850 fraud-suspended providers had been quietly reinstated without oversight.

Kennedy emphasized the measles outbreak began before his tenure commenced, with U.S. cases significantly outpacing Mexico and Canada despite lower population ratios. His testimony framed the administration’s actions as a necessary correction to systemic failures previously enabled by federal policy choices.