CMS Issues Final Rule on Changes to the Medicare Advantage and Part D Programs
Client Alert | 1 min read | 04.07.10
On April 6, 2010, CMS issued a final rule that revises regulations governing the Medicare Advantage program and the Part D prescription drug benefit program. The proposed rule was issued on October 22, 2009. Click here for our summary on Crowell.com.
According to CMS, the final rule strengthens beneficiary protections, ensures that plan offerings to beneficiaries include meaningful differences, improves plan payment rules and processes, strengthens various program participation and exit requirements, improve data collection for oversight and quality assessment, implement a new Part D formulary policy, and clarify or add other important program requirements. The final rule also includes a dispute and appeals process for risk-adjustment data validation.
The final rule will be published in the Federal Register on April 15, 2010, but is available now at http://www.federalregister.gov/inspection.aspx#special
Insights
Client Alert | 3 min read | 06.12.26
DOJ Guidance Backs Away From Disparate Impact Liability
On June 9, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued a formal opinion concluding that the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission’s (EEOC) existing interpretations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) disparate-impact liability, including the Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures (UGESP), are unconstitutional. According to the opinion, EEOC’s prior interpretations contemplate liability based on disproportionately adverse effects alone, without regard to an employer’s likely intent, rather than treating disparate impact as an evidentiary mechanism to “smoke out” intentional discrimination. DOJ found that this approach functions as a “qualified racial-proportionality mandate” that places “a racial thumb on the scales, often requiring employers to evaluate the racial outcomes of their policies, and to make decisions based on (because of) those racial outcomes.” The opinion fulfills one mandate of Executive Order 14281, which rejected disparate-impact liability insofar as it “creates a near insurmountable presumption that unlawful discrimination exists wherever there are any differences in outcomes among different [demographic groups].”
Client Alert | 4 min read | 06.12.26
Auto Dealers: The FTC Is Back in the Driver’s Seat — Warning Letters Signal Renewed Federal Scrutiny
Client Alert | 13 min read | 06.12.26
Client Alert | 4 min read | 06.12.26
