Grassley, Chaffetz rebuke HHS secretary for muzzling agency employees

By artappraiser on Wed, 05/10/2017 - 7:31am |

By Juliet Eilperin @ The Washington Post, May 9

Two Republican lawmakers charged with conducting government oversight sharply rebuked Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price on Tuesday for curtailing his employees’ ability to communicate directly with Congress and suggested that the move violates federal law.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) and House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said the policy that Price’s chief of staff outlined in a memo last week “is potentially illegal and unconstitutional, and will likely chill protected disclosures of waste, fraud, and abuse.”

In the May 3 memo, chief of staff Lance Leggitt informed senior HHS staff members that “any communications with Members of Congress and staff should not occur without prior consultation with the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Legislation.” [....]

URL:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/grassley-chaffetz-rebuke-hhs-secretary-for-muzzling-agency-employees/2017/05/09/e4e00288-34e2-11e7-b373-418f6849a004_story.html

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West Virginia journalist arrested after asking HHS Secretary Tom Price a question

By Samantha Smith @ The Washington Post, May 10

As Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price walked through a hallway Tuesday in the West Virginia State Capitol, veteran reporter Dan Heyman followed alongside him, holding up his phone to Price while attempting to ask him a question.

Heyman, a journalist with Public News Service, repeatedly asked the secretary whether domestic violence would be considered a preexisting condition under the Republican bill to overhaul the nation’s health care system, he said.

“He didn’t say anything,” Heyman said later in a news conference. “So I persisted.”

Then, an officer in the Capitol pulled him aside, handcuffed him and arrested him. Heyman was jailed on the charge of “Willful Disruption of State Government Processes” and was released later on $5,000 bail [....]

by artappraiser on Wed, 05/10/2017 - 7:36am

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Grassley, Chaffetz rebuke HHS secretary for muzzling agency employees

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