Only one senator voted against RI’s new health insurance commissioner. Here’s why.

A single protest vote was the only hitch in the otherwise unanimous Senate confirmation vote for the state’s new Health Insurance Commissioner Cory King.

The final tally was 34-to-1, with Senate Commerce Committee Chairwoman V. Susan Sosnowski casting the lone nay vote after a run of colleagues sang King’s praises. Sosnowski is the lead sponsor of a bill – panned by King at a recent hearing – to require “regional parity” in the rates Rhode Island’s private insurers pay doctors.

King has been serving as acting commissioner since December 2022. He previously served as the chief of staff in the Office of the Health Insurance Commissioner from 2021-22, and director of policy, from 2019 to 2021.