D.C.-Based Health Care Exchange May Have Engaged in Illegal Political Activity

Online communications 

with OFA allegedly 

violated 

Hatch Act

A former chief White House ethics lawyer has filed a Hatch Act complaint against a D.C.-based health care exchange, alleging that its online communications with liberal activist group Organizing for Action (OFA) violated rules against federal political activity.

Richard Painter, who served as the chief ethics counsel under President George W. Bush, requested a federal investigation into DC Health Link in a Nov. 13 letter to the Office of Special Counsel’s Carolyn Lerner.

Painter says DC Health Link appears to be subject to the Hatch Act, which limits political activity by federal employees, because the health exchange was created by the D.C. government and is acting on its behalf. He noted that the exchange may have violated the Hatch Act after it promoted OFA’s pro-Obamacare activism on Twitter.

Painter said DC Health Link may have also violated the Hatch Act by “following” OFA’s D.C. twitter account and retweeting one of its messages on Nov. 8.

The Office of Special Counsel determined that federal agencies cannot “friend,” “like,” or “follow” political parties, partisan political campaigns or partisan political groups on social media platforms. Agencies are also restricted to posting content that is related to official business and politically neutral.

“The communications that I believe violated the Hatch Act were made on Twitter and all relate to Organizing for Action (“OFA”), formerly known as Organizing for America, an organization the [Office of Special Counsel] has specifically identified as a ‘partisan political group,’” wrote Painter.

Via: WFB

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The end of civil service?

Over 140 years ago, the federal government began its reform of the bureaucracy to the civil-service system, a process which took decades to complete.  Its pinnacle of reform came in 1939 when Congress passed the Hatch Act, which barred federal employees from conducting political activity on taxpayer time and government property.  As government expanded rapidly from that point, though, the federal bureaucracy developed its own interests in policy, and this year we have reaped the results.  In my column for The Fiscal Times, I write that the IRS scandal and the National Parks Service antics during the shutdown show that the civil-service ideal is dead — especially in this administration:

In May, the Inspector General for the IRS found that the agency had targeted groups applying for tax-exempt status on the basis of their political beliefs, especially those groups that referenced the Tea Party. Those target lists continued to be used as IRS officials such as Commissioner Douglas Shulman testified to Congress that the agency conducted no such targeting.

Nor was that that the only way in which the IRS scrutinized President Obama’s opposition.  USA Today reported three weeks ago that the IRS specifically targeted groups that had “anti-Obama rhetoric” in their literature.

In one case, with an application from the Patriots of Charleston, the IRS flagged “negative Obama commentary” on their website as a reason to hold up approval for their tax-exempt application.  For the Tea Party of North Idaho, “significant inflammatory language, highly emotional language” was enough to start peppering the group with demands to release information on their donors and the companies owned by those donors.  …

Unknown at the time but reported this week, the National Parks Service chased down a group of senior citizens at Yellowstone National Park when the shutdown commenced on October 1^st.  After informing the busload of tourists, some of whom were tourists from other countries, that the park was no longer accessible, the rangers locked them into a closed hotel for several hours with armed guards posted at the exits.  When finally allowed to get back on the bus and leave Yellowstone, rangers stopped the tourists from pausing to take pictures, chasing after them for “recreating.”

That arguably constitutes kidnapping or false arrest, especially conducted under color of authority for no other reason than to score political points in the shutdown.  One of the tourists called it “Gestapo tactics,” and an NPS ranger anonymously confirmed this as a deliberate strategy by NPS.  “We’ve been told to make life as difficult for people as we can,” the anonymous ranger told The Washington Times. “It’s disgusting.”

It certainly is, and it’s part of a disturbing pattern emerging in the second term of Barack Obama.

That last incident in particular goes far beyond the already-objectionable “Washington Monument strategy” of extorting operating funds out of Congress.  It speaks to two related developments in American governance — the expansion of power in the federal government, and the arbitrary manner in which it gets applied. That may be called many things, but it’s neither “civil” nor “service.”

Via: Hot Air

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Carney gets reporters talking football, not politics, during press gaggle

The traveling press corps managed to ask only seven non-football questions, according to the 1,985-word transcript provided by the White House. The gaggle’s first quarter was devoted to the president’s assessment of a disputed call during a Sept. 24 football game between the Green Bay Backers and the Seattle Seahawks.

“I have no announcements, but I do have to say that there is a pressing matter that kind of transcends all else for most Americans,” Carney said as he began the gaggle on Air Force One as it flew back from New York toward Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington.

Carney’s casual introduction prompted laughs from the attending reporters, two weeks after Carney began claiming that a little-known YouTube video prompted a lethal jihad attack on the U.S. Consulate in Libya.

“Come on. You’re not even waiting for the question, Carney,” a reporter joked with Carney.

“This morning I watched it, and it was really astounding,” continued Carney.

“And by ‘it,’ I mean the end of the Packers-Seahawks game,” he announced, 13 days after Cabinet Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was found in violation of the Hatch Act.

Via: The Daily Caller

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No Interest by the Media in Kathleen Sebelius’s Unlawful Campaign Activity

The media isn’t very interested in the illegal campaign activity by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. She pretty much admitted she broke the law, but all we get from the media is silence.

Reporters covering the White House don’t seem to have many questions about Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who was last week found in violation of federal law against engaging in political activity while on the job.
A review of transcripts by The Daily Caller indicate that no questions have been asked by the reporters who cover the president about Sebelius during official White House briefings or gaggles since Sept. 12, when the U.S. Office of Special Counsel said in a report that the cabinet secretary violated the Hatch Act earlier this year.
It’s still up to President Obama whether Sebelius should keep her job or face some sort of punishment after being found in violation of the Hatch Act. (Read More)

This evening ABC News spent about 10 minutes on the video of remarks Mitt Romney made at a private fundraiser. They didn’t mention this.

Via: The Lonely Conservative

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Congress Could Impeach Sebelius

Obama must punish Sebelius

In a Monday memorandum, government watchdog group Cause of Action argued that President Barack Obama must fire – or at least suspend for 30 days without pay – Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius for her Hatch Act violation or his top-ranking health care official could face impeachment.

The U.S. Office of Special Counsel said last Wednesday that Sebelius violated the law when she publicly endorsed Obama’s re-election and North Carolina Lieutenant Gov. Walter Dalton’s gubernatorial primary in a multi-way race during a taxpayer-funded public event on Feb. 25, 2012. The standard penalty for violating the Hatch Act is termination. But, the White House has suggested that Obama will offer Sebelius special treatment and let her keep her job.

According to OSC, any “employee who violates the Hatch Act shall be removed from their position, and funds appropriated for the position from which removed thereafter may not be used to pay the employee or individual.”

Federal government employees who are not politically appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate may have their punishment lessened from termination “if the Merit Systems Protection Board finds by unanimous vote that the violation does not warrant removal, a penalty of not less than a 30-day suspension without pay shall be imposed by direction of the board.”

But, according to Cause of Action executive director Dan Epstein, since Sebelius is a Senate-confirmed presidential appointee, she isn’t entitled to such a review.

“Thus the point is that by close of business on Sept. 12, 2012, the president has been informed of a Hatch Act violation and yet has decided not to fire Sebelius,” Epstein said. “The president has therefore decided to overlook the improper political activities of his appointees when in their official capacities. He has effectively said it is okay to politicize the executive branch.”

According to the Monday Cause of Action memo, “[i]n an unprecedented situation like the present one, the President takes ‘appropriate action’ by substituting himself into the role of the MSPB – in other words ‘appropriate action’ means that the president must suspend Secretary Sebelius for at least 30 days or remove her from office.”