WASHINGTON, DC - House Energy and Commerce Committee leaders today sent a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell regarding a June 3, 2014, request for information on state-run health exchanges. The committee leaders write, “Despite the committee’s extensive efforts to accommodate HHS, your agency has failed to meet not only the original June 18 deadline, but also a number of extended production deadlines offered by the committee. … We now request that HHS produce all documents responsive to the committee’s June 3 request no later than September 19. …If HHS does not meet this deadline, the committee will consider other steps to compel their production."
The June 3 letter explained, “According to data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), the Department of Health and Human Services has awarded at least $1,314,625,070 for State Based Exchanges that have failed or are so flawed that they require substantial modification."
“I do not understand why the administration appears to repeatedly stonewall our calls for transparency while the American people continue to pay the price for the president’s health care law. The administration has failed to explain to the American people how more than $1 billion was spent on broken websites in just seven states," commented full committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI). “Sadly, withholding information has been a hallmark throughout implementation of the president’s health care law. Our pursuit for answers continues."
“Our thoughtful and thorough investigation of the president’s failed health care law has been an uphill battle as we have repeatedly been met with resistance from the self-proclaimed most transparent administration in history," commented Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Tim Murphy (R-PA). “We are now just ten weeks away from the start of the next open enrollment period. Will these exchanges be working? At what cost to taxpayers? The time for transparency is now."
The letter was signed by Upton, Murphy, full committee Vice Chairman Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Chairman Emeritus Joe Barton (R-TX), and Vice Chairman of the Health and Oversight and Investigations Subcommittees Michael C. Burgess, M.D. (R-TX).
Read the complete letter online here.
