PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WJAR) — The Rhode Island Attorney General’s Office is pushing back after the announcement of steep health insurance premium hikes for 2026.
The Office of the Health Insurance Commissioner, or OHIC, announced a drastic rise in premiums this week, citing the increased cost of health care services and pharmaceuticals, new fees approved by the General Assembly, and the end of Enhanced Premium Tax Credits.
Premiums will jump an average of 21% in the individual market, 17.6% in the small group market, and 19.3% in the large group market.
In an interview with NBC 10 earlier this week, Gov. Dan McKee said part of the problem is OHIC needs more teeth.
“We got to make sure that anywhere where we can empower the OHIC because that’s who’s got the authority to set these rates,” he said.
Attorney General Peter Neronha says affordability shouldn’t rest solely with the OHIC, as the office doesn’t take the economic impact into account.
“It’s not just about numbers, it’s about looking at these proposed increases in the context of economic impact on Rhode Islanders,” Neronha said. “When you look at it through that lens, which the commissioner did not, what you see is that the increases as proposed and as allowed by the commissioner will bring the cost of healthcare to 30% of household income. That’s an enormous amount of money.”
Neronha said the commissioner’s rate review process should be eliminated and replaced.
“When I talk about the Health Insurance Commissioner’s rate review as an illegitimate process, I mean it only looks, particularly under this commissioner, at solvency for the insurance companies, and from my view that’s looking at it much too narrowly to the detriment of Rhode Islanders.”
Neronha disagrees that the OHIC should be given more power, as suggested by the governor.
“I think there is a knowledge gap for the Governor when it comes to healthcare, for certain, because he has done nothing. He hasn’t charged his department, his Medicaid office, his Health Insurance Commissioner, to go back and fix the system that is clearly failing Rhode Island,” he said.
Neronha says his office is working to create legislation for a public payer option for insurance, which he believes would increase competition and lower prices.
“That’s something that we in this office are going to work and are working with the Brown School of Public Health to come up with a public payer option for insurance that will compete in the marketplace with commercial insurance and eventually show Rhode Islanders that something closer to a public health system will work better for them,” he said.
It’s still unclear how a public payer option would be funded.
The Office of the Health Insurance Commissioner’s report mentions that this year, the Attorney General did not hire actuaries to review the rate filings or submit public comment, as it has in the past.
“The Attorney General elected to forgo an actuarial review and did not submit comments on the group market rates. Instead, the Attorney General hired a health economist to provide testimony during the public rate hearings on BCBSRI’s and NHPRI’s individual market rate filings,” the report reads.
The economist, Dr. Christopher Whaley, testified on the harmful impacts of the rate increases on consumers and households and the impacts of tariffs and inflation.
The Health Insurance Commissioner says that testimony was considered in his decisions on individual market rates.
Gov. McKee’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Neronha’s remarks.
Neronha dismissed suggestions that his criticism of the governor’s comments and handling of rising health insurance premiums signals a bid for governor.
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