Sebelius, White House Suppress Negative Report on Obamacare Costs Prior to Vote

Meredith Jessup | April 27, 2010 1:29 PM

Last week's HHS economic report--the one that said Obamacare will increase the cost of health care--was actually submitted to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius

more than a week before Congress voted to pass the measure. American Spectator reports that career HHS sources say Sebelius' staff actually refused to review the report before the vote was taken:

"The reason we were given was that they did not want to influence the vote," says an HHS source. "Which is actually the point of having a review like this, you would think."
The analysis, performed by Medicare's Office of the Actuary, which in the past has been identified as a "nonpolitical" office, set off alarm bells when submitted. "We know a copy was sent to the White House via their legislative affairs staff," says the HHS staffer, "and there were a number of meetings here almost right after the analysis was submitted to the secretary's office. Everyone went into lockdown, and people here were too scared to go public with the report."
In the end, the report was released several weeks after the vote -- the review by the secretary's office reportedly took less than three days -- and bore a note that the analysis was not the official position of the Obama administration.

Full story here