Oklahoma City (January 23, 2026) – Today, Governor Kevin Stitt signed an executive order to address concerns surrounding the administration of Medicare Advantage (MA) plans in Oklahoma, including the resulting burden imposed on healthcare providers and reduced access to care for consumers across the state, particularly in rural and underserved areas.
The executive order aims to support healthcare providers, protect consumers from predatory enrollment practices, force accountability of MA plan administration, and increase overall access to care for more Oklahomans.
“This is about protecting vulnerable Oklahomans and ensuring our healthcare providers can provide them with the care they need, wherever and whenever they need it,” said Governor Stitt. “It’s become increasingly apparent that guardrails are necessary to ensure Medicare Advantage is fulfilling its promise to consumers and is operating with full transparency in our marketplace.”
“This executive order will require Medicare Advantage companies to keep their promises to our seniors, in plain language,” said Clay Bullard, Secretary of Health. “Oklahoma’s seniors and healthcare providers deserve better. With direct state governance from the Oklahoma Insurance Department and Healthcare Authority, while working within our state-federal partnership, we believe more transparency and better contracting will secure the care and payments they deserve.”
Key requirements established by this order include:
• Consumer protections: MA plans and their representatives are prohibited from offering inducements, bribes, or other benefits to influence beneficiary plan selections and may only offer CMS-approved supplemental benefits to potential MA members. Similarly, MA plans must be truthful in all marketing and enrollment practices and not employ high-pressure tactics or misleading representations of offerings.
• Provider protections: Requires 14-day prompt payments and bans improper denials for Traditional Medicare services, which would eliminate cash crunches and red tape so rural doctors stay open and quality care remains available.
• Patient access to care: MA plans must maintain provider networks sufficient to ensure access to care in the Oklahoma counties where they are sold.
• Annual Transparency Reports: MA plans must submit data on payments, networks, denials to the Oklahoma Insurance Department (OID) annually, and OID and the Oklahoma Health Care Authority (OHCA) must provide the Office of the Governor a report on enforcement actions and provider impacts.
The full text of the executive order is available here.
###
