Trump admin seeks medical records of federal workers—for vague reasons
- Thread starter JournalBot
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As is, with no renovations, preferably.
I cannot imagine the federal employee unions standing by without seeking to have this blocked.
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It's going to be a complete shitshow once these goons are thrown out. As you say, a lot of them should be headed to jail. Not prosecuting them isn't an option - we're right now watching how that turns out - but when a future government starts prosecuting these people for their very real crimes, there will be a lot of people* saying it's just Democrats doing the same thing as Trump's political revenge prosecutions of the totally made-up crimes of Clinton, Comey and James.
*A lot of MAGA arseholes, sure, but I'll bet dollars to donuts that the NYT will also run some version of "Democrats rightly condemned Trump's politicisation of the DoJ and must not do it themselves"
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Sadly, America allowed him to become an autocratic dictator with virtually no limits to his power, so yeah, he probably can and will do what he wants. Because nobody is stopping him.
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Both, on a scale we haven't seen (yet) revealed. Plus other things too bizarre (or stupid) to suspect yet.
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Isn't Trump and some of his family federal employees. I assume they will also happily hand over their full medical records.
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There is absolutely zero fucking reason this orange whore and his admin needs these records. There is zero legitimate reason.
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Ask the Pope to put it in writing for you. And if he won’t, find another Pope.
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I've asked Dollar Shave Club to add Occam's Razor to my monthly subscription.
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I'd even argue that Donald has absolutely no idea this is being demanded.
How often has a journalist asked him about a policy and he's looked visibly shocked at how shitty it is?
He's got the mind of a toddler. The ballroom, the Trump arch, the Trump Kennedy centre rebuild, Trump library etc... All of these are jangly keys to keep him happy while he gives free reign to people like Steven Miller to do this shit.
Collecting the health records of government employees comes after requesting voting records of the same people. This is how you cull a government. Possibly literally knowing who's in charge.
I'm not "good Tsar, bad Boyar'ing" him by any means, He's a straight up monster. But he's not got the brains or foresight to think of this or understand the ramifications.
Edit: Spelling
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As I responded in a different thread, "Independent thinking?", what are you a communist?
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I'm no HIPAA expert, but where exactly is OPM designated to do ANYTHING in that law?
It's not mentioned by name, that's for sure. 99% of the law is "the Secretary [of HHS] shall...."
The only other entities mentioned at all are the Attorney General, the HHS Inspector General, and other HHS components.
It's not mentioned by name, that's for sure. 99% of the law is "the Secretary [of HHS] shall...."
The only other entities mentioned at all are the Attorney General, the HHS Inspector General, and other HHS components.
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I respectfully disagree.
The real tragedy of this will be that in 3-5 years, hiring at the federal level will not have recovered because of this (and many other, but especially this) policy. For some people, even the fact that this was threatened will be enough to never consider a gov job again and quit now if they have one. Fear is the strongest motivator. Of course, many people who politically align with Trump will assume they won't be purged and stay on.
The fiscal "responsibility" republicans and the mega rich agree on one thing—the government is a beast that should be starved. This will help.
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Have we broken all the 10 commandments yet?
Yes.
What white collar crime haven't we committed yet?
HIPAA violation?
Great idea! But let me post on Kalshi first.
Yes.
What white collar crime haven't we committed yet?
HIPAA violation?
Great idea! But let me post on Kalshi first.
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Member when OPM was hacked and they stole everyones information? Pepperidge Farms I remember.
I still have the letter that says something along the lines of:
"We are sending this to you because we were hacked and all your information was stolen. We aren't going to do fuck all about it but we needed to make it look like we at least gave some sort of a shit. Have a nice day and fuck off."
Sincerely,
OPM
I still have the letter that says something along the lines of:
"We are sending this to you because we were hacked and all your information was stolen. We aren't going to do fuck all about it but we needed to make it look like we at least gave some sort of a shit. Have a nice day and fuck off."
Sincerely,
OPM
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MilanKraft
Ars Tribunus Angusticlavius
Because the data is medical (personal) in nature, "root out the woke / hate" is most likely for this bingo card... that and/or using one's private information against them to force cooperation when illegal requests are made. They know they can't run the machine by themselves; they need worker bees, preferably experienced ones. Mass exoduses don't necessarily help their cause, despite the early penchant for mass-layoffs in some departments.
...also this. As someone said, fascists gonna fascist. Just waiting out the non-prediction-markets bet (because fuck those guys with a rusty chainsaw) on "how long will it take the average, clueless, distracted American to figure out that being a fascist administration does not require death camps to be present (i.e. nazi is merely one brand of fascism). Although with these "immigrant warehousing" projects, there's still plenty of time for that to morph into something much uglier.
Misanthropic is the way.
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The absolute "best" case scenario for this admin is just flagging any procedures they don't like as waste and fraud and saying the VA or federal insurance won't cover them anymore.
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Hopefully in January of next year, after the midterms. If not, February of 2029.. maybe.
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This will open a floodgate of retaliation, blackmail, and claims by the government of insurance fraud that can secretly be used to demand compliance from federal workers, or to publicly shame them via disclosures or leaks that will force many to resign, and/or to strip them of their security clearances.
I have a feeling it will also be used to destroy health plans offered to current and retired government employees, to dissuade anyone from making a career of government service.
Given the amount of data that has already been stolen by these assholes, I expect that they’ll also be stealing this information to use as leverage to retain power by threatening to leak embarrassing details, or to silence critics.
Whatever it is, you can bet that fuckwad Russ Vought will be using it to further the trauma being inflicted on federal employees, and just in time to make use of it to inflict maximum damage in the lead up to the midterms.
I have a feeling it will also be used to destroy health plans offered to current and retired government employees, to dissuade anyone from making a career of government service.
Given the amount of data that has already been stolen by these assholes, I expect that they’ll also be stealing this information to use as leverage to retain power by threatening to leak embarrassing details, or to silence critics.
Whatever it is, you can bet that fuckwad Russ Vought will be using it to further the trauma being inflicted on federal employees, and just in time to make use of it to inflict maximum damage in the lead up to the midterms.
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The problem is, how would these people know that their medical records had been unlawfully shared? Do they get notified?
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Would being "traumatically affected" be grounds for an insanity defense?If/when the shit really hits the fan, Russ Vought will not come out unscathed. There are around three million federal employees, and though I’m not sure how many he considers bureaucrats, there are a lot of them. And some of them will have an axe to grind with him after being “traumatically affected”. Same goes for many others in this regime.
ETA: Also, that’s rich coming from the director of the OMB and CFPB. What does that make him? Oh, yeah, a fucking bureaucrat. Though he probably is thinking, “Not me! Don’t traumatically affect me! Do it to all those other, less deserving, less human bureaucrats!”
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Better question, do you think they will hesitate to throw all the underlings who were told to make it happen under the bus if someone successfully challenges it?
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When the less than scrupulous executives of CVS say "maybe you shouldn't do this" then you probably shouldn't do it.
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I used to have patience for people that voted for this administration and all the pain it has wrought. I wanted to believe they were misguided. Now I have no tolerance for them. They are dead to me.
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IANAL, but I wouldn't be at all shocked if HIPPA could be interpreted to have room for government collection of this data for loosely-specified oversight purposes. The government is always loathe to constrain itself in any meaningful fashion. Historically, government is constrained more by norms and calculations of what voters will tolerate than by law.
Unfortunately, it's become apparent that voters will tolerate pretty much anything as long as it's bad for the other team.
Unfortunately, it's become apparent that voters will tolerate pretty much anything as long as it's bad for the other team.
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Excuse me if my sympathy for a country that threatened genocide on Monday is severely limited. Y’all need to take serious stock of your new standing in the world.
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Wait, this request was 4 months ago, and supposed to recur monthly? I wonder how many insurance companies already handed over the information; might explain why so many refused to comment. It's likely going to take legal discovery (or some obvious consequence) to figure out what happened.
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And maybe unicorns will fly out of my ass, too. Which is probably not covered by my health insurance, so I'll be doubly surprised.
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I think it's worth noting that this highlights one of the potential problems with universal Healthcare. If the government is providing Americans with tax-funded health services, it's hard to imagine them doing so without carte blanche access to health related information, and I don't trust them with that.
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clearly they have no ill will or bad intentions with asking for all this data that they have no need of seeing?
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