A top Democratic digital firm that powered Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s presidential campaigns is now cashing in from a health insurance industry front group that is fighting to protect billions in alleged taxpayer overpayments to private insurers.
Bully Pulpit International has been paid millions by Democratic campaigns, party committees, and super PACs like Future Forward over the years. Now it’s also doing business with the Better Medicare Alliance (BMA), a lobbying organization backed by Republican-leaning industry giants like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and insurance companies including UnitedHealth.
BMA spends heavily on lobbying to defend health insurance companies’ Medicare Advantage profits, including by fighting against bipartisan reforms aimed at stopping insurers from inflating patient diagnoses, a practice known as “upcoding” that drains tens of billions annually from the Medicare trust funds.
Bully Pulpit was paid $8.9 million by the BMA for consulting services in 2024, according to the lobbying group’s most recent Form 990 filed with the Internal Revenue Service. It’s unclear when the company began working with BMA, but it was the first time Bully Pulpit has been disclosed as a vendor for the alliance, which in the past has mostly reported paying contractors from the healthcare industry such as Avalere Health and Republican PR firm Plus Communications. Bully Pulpit did not respond to a request for comment.
The BMA describes itself as a coalition composed of grassroots beneficiary advocates and health care organizations, but it can be thought of as a front group for insurance companies that want to expand the taxpayer-funded profits they receive from the Medicare Advantage program. The group was founded in 2014, and according to the Center for Public Integrity it was created by APCO Worldwide, a firm that specializes in setting up corporate font groups and creating political environments in support of its clients’ legislative and regulatory goals. APCO was BMA’s sole disclosed vendor during the group’s first year in existence, according to a tax filing.
The Better Medicare Alliance’s key industry members include major private insurers like UnitedHealth Group, Humana, and Aetna, as well as business lobbying behemoths like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers.
