Legal Library: Cases and Proceedings

The FTC filed a lawsuit against the three largest prescription drug benefit managers (PBMs)—Caremark Rx, Express Scripts (ESI), and OptumRx—and their affiliated group purchasing organizations (GPOs) for engaging in anticompetitive and unfair rebating practices that have artificially inflated the list price of insulin drugs.

On February 4, 2026, the Federal Trade Commission secured a landmark settlement with Express Scripts, Inc., and its affiliated entities (collectively “ESI”). The settlement requires ESI to adopt fundamental changes to its business practices that increase transparency, are expected to drive down patients’ out-of-pocket costs for drugs like insulin by up to $7 billion over 10 years, bring millions of dollars in new revenue to community pharmacies each year, and advance the Trump Administration’s key healthcare priorities.

Nevada-based Vanilla Chip LLC, which does business as TruHeight, and its two principals, Eden Stelmach and Justin Rapoport, have agreed to settle the Federal Trade Commission’s charges that they deceptively advertised the effectiveness of a range of supplements touted as supporting height growth in children and teenagers, and relied on reviews that were written by their own employees, or by consumers who were offered a free product or discount in return for writing a 5-star review. 

Publishing.com LLC and its two principals will pay $1.5 million and be required to substantiate earnings claims in the future to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that the company and its operators misled consumers about how much money they were likely to earn using their products.

The Federal Trade Commission is acting against a large automotive dealer group, Asbury Automotive, for systematically charging consumers for costly add-on items they did not agree to or were falsely told were required as part of their purchase. The FTC also alleges that Asbury discriminates against Black and Latino consumers, targeting them with unwanted and higher-priced add-ons.

In an administrative complaint, the FTC alleges that three Texas dealerships owned by Asbury that operate as David McDavid Ford Ft. Worth, David McDavid Honda Frisco, and David McDavid Honda Irving, along with Ali Benli, who acted as general manager of those dealerships, engaged in a variety of practices to sneak hidden fees for unwanted add-ons past consumers. These tactics included a practice called “payment packing,” where the dealerships convinced consumers to agree to monthly payments that were larger than needed to pay for the agreed-upon price of the car, and then “packed” add-on items to the sales contract to make up that difference.