Issa warns Sebelius of Possible Perjury Charges Over False Obamacare Testimony

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Wednesday, in a letter sent to HHS Kathleen Sebelius, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., suggested the secretary may have perjured herself when she appeared before Congress. He pressed for an explanation for the false and misleading statements she made about the security risks present on HealthCare.gov  and  requested the documents and communications that were made in preparation for Sebelius’s congressional appearances after October 1, 2013.

“Providing false or misleading testimony to Congress is a serious matter,” Issa wrote. “Documents and testimony obtained by the Committee, including information provided by Teresa Fryer, the Chief Information Security Officer at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and the MITRE Corporation, a contractor hired by HHS to conduct security assessments of healthcare.gov, show that your testimony was false and misleading.”

The letter cites four examples of false statements Sebelius made before Congress:

1) that MITRE was conducting ongoing security testing

2) that MITRE’s preliminary report “did not raise flags about going ahead”

3) that “no one… suggested that the risks outweighed the importance of moving forward”

4) that MITRE made recommendations to CMS about moving forward.

“Although the four examples of misinformation and falsehoods from your Congressional testimony late last year are extremely troubling,” Issa wrotes, “your failure during numerous Congressional hearings to explicitly mention the serious problems with security testing in the month prior to launch creates the appearance that you carefully chose language that would mislead Members of Congress and the American public.”

You can read the complete letter to Secretary Sebelius here.

Hat tip White House Dossier.

Linked by Doug Ross, thanks!