When Katherine G. Sebelius resigned April 10, saving President Barack Obama the task of overtly firing her as head of the Health and Human Services Department, it was less than three weeks after the Government
Accountability Office handed her and the White House its report documenting her shakedown of private entities to support the implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The report, published March 21, released to the public April 21, “Solicitations of Support for Enroll America,” details how Sebelius under the color of law hammered CEO’s of five different organizations into donating to Enroll America.
Enroll America is a front group set up by Obama operatives, such as Anne Filipic, the former White House director of public engagement and before that a senior aide to Sebelius. It functions with the implied authority of the president, but without any of the legal or ethical restraints of the office. Despite being a fully-owned subsidiary of Team Obama, Enroll America has the look and feel of a government agency tasked to help people to the Promised Land of Obamacare.
Enroll America staffers and HHS staffers worked hand-in-glove with each other as full partners, and in her regular talking points about Obamacare, Sebelius plugged Enroll America and left no doubt that the group was in complete synch with HHS.
On Enroll’s board of directors are representatives from pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies and other hacks, such as American’s top pro-Abortion nun, Sister Carol Keehan, president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association of the United States.
This was no nickel-and-dime operation. Jeanne Lambrew, a White House aide, who came over from Sibelius’s HHS, called up the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation, and told the foundation that it would it would be a good idea for RWJF to support a private organization dedicated to encouraging Americans to sign-up for government-run health care.
RWJF: How much?
JL: Make it $30 million.
The first RWJF check was for $10 million. Um, a little short—but, still pretty good considering that Robert Woods Johnson, the owner of the New York Jets and Johnson and Johnson fortune scion, was a major fundraiser for the White House campaign of former Massachusetts governor W. Mitt Romney.
One week after Obama began his second term, Sebelius call RWJF CEO Risa Lavizzo-Mourey to encourage her to continue to support enrollments in Obamacare. In April 2013, Enroll America received another $3 million and then another $10 million in May. RWJF also stroked checks to Families USA, another Obama front.
Sebelius also called Alex Gorsky, the CEO of Johnson and Johnson April 11, 2013 to suggest that Johnson and Johnson provide non-financial support to help with enrollments.
H&R Block’s CEO William C. Cobb picked up the phone April 29, 2013 to find Sebelius on the other end.
Cobb was told by the HHS head that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act has been great for his company bottom line—and it would be a great idea for his company to send some cash to Enroll America.
There were also calls Sebelius made to Kaiser, the health care organization, and Ascension Health, the Catholic hospital chain. Kaiser, as a member of the Enroll America board of directors, told investigators that it intended to support Enroll America, all along. Ascension ended up pairing its employees with members of Enroll America’s staff to set up webinars and training sessions in their facilities.
While no check arrived, internal HHS documents reveal that Enroll America and HHS staff discussed putting the touch on Ascension for $1 million.
The GAO did not give up the names, but the report also said Enroll America asked Sebelius to make calls to at least three other CEO’s, and in one case Enroll America specified a dollar amount.
Now, Sebelius is gone. But, the thug culture of the Obama administration remains with us for three more long, dark years. These guys came in to office with such an attitude of sanctity, and yet every day we find out another one they are just a gang of crooks.
But, maybe I am too harsh. Maybe, just like #Benghazi or Fast and Furious, The IRS targeting of Tea Party groups and the Solyndra scheme, this is just an isolated incident. Maybe.
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