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Effort to repeal medical privacy rule fails as House refuses to
vote on HJR 38
Dear Friends:
Here's a brief update on our
campaign to stop the new HHS medical privacy regulation.
Despite more than 61,000 e-mail
lobbying messages, 13 co-sponsors, and a last-minute flurry of phone calls
to Capitol Hill, privacy advocates have fallen short in an effort to
derail the federal government's so-called medical privacy regulation.
On June 15, a 60-day window for
Congress to "veto" the regulation slammed shut, with no action
taken on HJR 38, a bill filed by Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX) that would
have repealed the new regulation.
As a result, the Health &
Human Services regulation, which will force doctors to turn their
patients' confidential medical records over to the government, has
officially gone into effect. The regulation was drafted by the Clinton
administration and was quietly implemented in April, 2001, by President
George W. Bush, despite the growing public outcry against it.
During the week of June 11,
privacy advocates mounted a last-ditch effort to repeal the regulation by
flooding their congressional representatives with thousands of phone calls
demanding a vote on HJR 38. But House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-IL,
refused to bring the measure to a vote, ending any chance of killing the
HHS regulation.
Capitol Hill sources said the
House schedule was "very light" the week of June 15, and "a
vote could easily have been scheduled. Hastert just didn't want to."
"Privacy advocates made a
tremendous effort," said Libertarian Party National Director Steve
Dasbach, "but we've lost what we always knew would be an uphill
fight. The problem was that Democrats supported the regulation because it
was Bill Clinton's baby, and Republicans supported the regulation because
George W. Bush endorsed it. It was classic Washington DC bipartisanship:
The politicians won, and the American public -- and privacy -- lost."
Since the DefendYourPrivacy.com
campaign was launched in mid-April, 61,999 people signed a petition
opposing the regulation and 13 Congressional co-sponsors signed on in
support of HJR 38. But that wasn't enough to tip the balance against a
measure supported by the leadership of both parties.
What happens now? Is there any
way protect medical privacy in the future?
It's possible that a member of
Congress could write legislation to repeal the regulation, but such a bill
would be unlikely to pass, for several reasons.
First, it would have to go
through the full committee process, unlike HJR 38, which would have
immediately become law if the House and Senate approved it by June 15.
That process would give politicians plenty of opportunity to amend it or
water it down.
Second, the bill would have to
get through the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee,
which is now chaired by Ted Kennedy, one of the biggest supporters of the
HHS regulation.
Third, even if such a bill got
through both houses of Congress, there's no reason to think that President
Bush would sign it. After all, he's the one who ordered his HHS Secretary,
Tommy Thompson, to implement the rule in the first place.
So the bad news is that
Americans are stuck with this regulation for the foreseeable future. But
that does *not* mean that we will sit idly by when the government attempts
other privacy violations. These HHS rules are a setback for privacy, but
allowing similar rules to be imposed in the future would be a disaster. We
will not surrender in the fight for privacy simply because we have lost
one battle.
Our supporters have
successfully fought other government privacy invasions in the past -- such
as the FDIC's Know Your Customer bank spying law and legislation that
would have outlawed certain websites -- and we will do so again. So please
stay posted, and let's keep up the fight for privacy.
Again, thank you for helping us
fight the HHS regulation!
Sincerely,
Steve Dasbach
National Director
Libertarian Party
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