Kennedy defends Trump claims on drug discounts

April 24, 2026

Summary

Kennedy told senators Trump “has a different way of calculating” prescription drug discounts, defending claims that exceed 100%.

Why this matters

The exchange highlights scrutiny of how the Trump administration describes prescription drug savings. It also underscores the importance of clear, accurate pricing claims for consumers comparing drug costs.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. defended President Donald Trump’s calculation of prescription drug discounts during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on Wednesday, saying the president “has a different way of calculating.”

“If you have a $600 drug, and you reduce it to $10, that’s a 600% reduction,” Kennedy said.

A drop from $600 to $10 is a discount of more than 98%. A discount cannot exceed 100% without reducing the price to zero or below.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., raised the issue while questioning Kennedy about Protonix, a prescription drug listed on the federally run TrumpRx website, compared with the price of a generic version at Costco. Warren said some Americans using TrumpRx were still paying more for drugs.

She also referred to Trump’s repeated claims that TrumpRx offered discounts of 400% to 1,500%. “Which I think means companies should be paying you to take their drugs,” Warren said.

Kennedy initially did not address Warren’s question about Protonix pricing and instead defended Trump’s math.

Trump has made similar claims since promoting TrumpRx, which began with deals announced last year with pharmaceutical companies to lower some drug prices.

He later said the discount depended “on how you want to calculate it.”

On March 25, Trump again said, “We have lowered the price of drugs by 50, 60, 70 and 80 and 90%. And there’s another way of figuring, you could also say, depending on the way you phrased the statement, 400, 500, 600, 700%. Nobody’s ever seen anything like it.”

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Full story +

Oil rose to a three-week high above $110 a barrel in London as traders awaited the U.S. response to an Iranian proposal to end the war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

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Trump and his national security team are skeptical of the proposal but will continue talks, and the White House is likely to offer a response and counterproposals in the coming days.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a Fox News interview aired Monday that Iran appeared to want to retain control of Hormuz, which he said was unacceptable to the U.S. Before the war, about one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas moved through the waterway.

Two Iran-linked oil tankers interdicted by U.S. forces near Sri Lanka last week appeared to have stopped heading west in the Indian Ocean and turned around. The U.S. cordon on shipping to and from Iranian ports began April 13 and has turned away dozens of vessels.