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Christi Grimm, the former inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), spoke to Congress today. Here is some of what she said:
'We follow the facts wherever they lead': Inspector general who was demoted after Trump attacked her speaks out on the importance of independent oversight
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"We follow the facts wherever they lead, we are impartial in what we do, and really anything that is done that could impair independence, I think, compromises the effectiveness of oversight of programs that are there to serve the American public — in our case the 300 programs within HHS," Grimm said.
Grimm angered Trump after she released a report in March that said there were "severe shortages" of testing kits in the US, "widespread shortages" of masks and other personal protective equipment at hospitals across the country, and significant delays in getting coronavirus test results. The deficits hampered the US's ability to respond effectively to the coronavirus outbreak and curb its spread, the report found.
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[Trump] later attacked Grimm on Twitter as well, writing, "Why didn't the I.G., who spent 8 years with the Obama Administration (Did she Report on the failed H1N1 Swine Flu debacle where 17,000 people died?), want to talk to the Admirals, Generals, V.P. & others in charge, before doing her report."
(Grimm joined the inspector general's office in 1999 during the Clinton administration and served under both Democratic and Republican administrations. She was not a political appointee.)
In Trumpworld, if you speak out trying to protect the American people — you can expect to be attacked by know-nothing Trump. AND you can expect to lose your job — especially if you speak in terms of facts and science.
Especially if you speak the truth, that Trump thinks will put him in a bad light.
In Trumpworld, protecting the American people, is last on the agenda — whereas protecting Trump’s fragile ego, is always Job One.
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The HHS Inspector General Report
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We asked the White House how the report from the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General was “wrong.” We haven’t received a response. On Twitter, the president claimed the report was “Another Fake Dossier!”
We encourage readers to examine the report for themselves. We find it to be a straight-forward report on the results of a survey.
Released April 6, the HHS inspector general’s report detailed the results of the survey of hospital administrators, making clear in the opening sentences that it provides “a national snapshot of hospitals’ challenges and needs in responding to the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic” and “is not a review of HHS response to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The information is meant “as an aid for HHS as it continues to lead efforts to address the public health emergency and support hospitals and other first responders,” the report continued. It also said hospitals “may find the information about each other’s strategies useful.”
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Facts — are an “endangered species” in Trumpworld.
It’s as if they never even happened.
Given how the National Media just let’s the requisite Fact Checks … slide.
Or is it OK now, that dedicated public servants like Grimm are FIRED — for just doing their job, and trying to sound the alarm, in hopes of protecting the American people ???
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‘Replacing Them with Loyalists’: Lawyers Rip Trump for Sacking HHS Deputy Inspector General Christi Grimm
by Colin Kalmbacher, Law and Crime — May 2, 2020
“The purge of those who can conduct oversight of and scrutinize the actions of the executive branch continues unabated,” national security and federal employment attorney Bradley P. Moss told Law&Crime in an email. “The president won’t be satisfied until he has destroyed every element of accountability we have built up over decades of good governance reforms.”
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As of Aug 2019, actual fact checks show that 70% of what Trump says has been scored as False.