Trump Drug Holdings Rose as Medicare Exemptions Expanded

At the end of 2025, President Donald Trump’s pharmaceutical holdings reached as much as $56.2 million, according to a report from congressional Democrats. Up to $39.1 million was invested in companies benefiting from exemptions in Republicans’ tax and spending law. The law expanded an exemption that can delay or prevent Medicare price negotiations for certain costly drugs. The report says Trump’s portfolio bought shares in companies that benefited from the policy before he signed the legislation.

The figures place a president’s investment interests alongside a federal policy that can affect what Medicare beneficiaries pay for medicines. Beneficiaries receiving Keytruda, made by Merck, and Opdivo, made by Bristol Myers Squibb, could pay roughly $5,000 more annually than they would if Medicare negotiated prices for those drugs, the report estimates. Trump’s portfolio includes stock in both companies.

The holdings and the law

The Joint Economic Committee’s minority arm released its report Friday. It says the maximum reported value of Trump’s pharmaceutical holdings rose from $1.7 million in 2024 to as much as $56.2 million at the end of 2025. Up to $39.1 million of the holdings consisted of stock in companies benefiting from exemptions created through a provision in the 2025 tax and spending law.

Committee Democrats analyzed financial disclosures and found that the portfolio bought as much as $2.55 million in shares of pharmaceutical companies benefiting from the exemptions on three dates before Trump signed the legislation in July 2025. One purchase, worth as much as $950,000, came on July 1, 2025, the day the Senate passed the bill. In August 2025, after the law took effect, the portfolio bought as much as $1 million in AbbVie stock.

The report says the portfolio kept buying and selling pharmaceutical stocks during the first eight months of 2026, adding as much as $3.5 million in stock wealth in the sector. It also says Trump’s wealth has grown since he took office through business interests, many of which have benefited from administration policy moves.

Who pays under the exemption

A law enacted during President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration first allowed Medicare to negotiate prices for some of the costliest prescription drugs. Republicans’ 2025 tax and spending bill expanded an existing exemption for medicines developed to treat rare diseases or conditions. Healthcare research nonprofit KFF says the change can delay when certain costly drugs become eligible for negotiation or exclude them entirely.

The provision is also called the orphan drug exclusion. It lets drug companies keep charging prices that Medicare negotiations might otherwise have reduced. Supporters said the broader exemption would encourage development of rare-disease treatments. Critics said it lets makers of blockbuster drugs avoid negotiations that could lower costs for Medicare and its recipients.

The report’s estimate for Keytruda and Opdivo describes a potential cost to beneficiaries under the policy. Recipients could pay roughly $5,000 more annually than they would if Medicare negotiated prices, it says. Some beneficiaries could face thousands of dollars in additional costs for certain cancer treatments and other medications under the exemptions policy.

Denials and the political dispute

Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan, who leads the committee’s minority arm, called the findings “outrageous and yet typical from this president, who makes the American people foot the bill again and again for his own gains.” The White House has repeatedly denied ethics issues and accused Democrats of “attempts to fabricate conflicts of interest.”

White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said third-party financial institutions independently manage Trump’s stock and bond portfolio, and denied a conflict of interest. “Neither President Trump nor any member of his family has any ability to direct, influence, or provide input regarding how the portfolio is invested or when investments are bought or sold,” Ingle said.

The findings surfaced as Trump made lowering prescription drug costs a central part of his healthcare policy and struck deals with pharmaceutical companies that his administration said would make medications more affordable. Drug pricing depends on a complicated set of factors. Recent polling from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that most Americans think Trump is profiting from the presidency in unethical or illegal ways and is more focused on his wealth than helping people like them.