House Oversight and Government Reform committee members said on Tuesday that they have received information indicating the administration directed contractors to hide price comparisons from unregistered users on the federal insurance exchange website.
Leaders of the committee sent a letter to Steve VanRoekel, the chief information officer at the White House Office of Management and Budget, and Chief Technology Officer Todd Park requesting information about the development of the federal health exchange website HealthCare.gov.
“Given the information gathered by the committee thus far, we are concerned that the administration required contractors to change course late in the implementation process to conceal Obamacare’s effect on increasing health insurance premiums,” the committee said in the letter.
The committee said the decision to mask the “sticker shock” of insurance premiums prevented contractors from using IT best practices in development and rollout of the website.
“Although (CGI Federal) officials were not able to identify who within the administration made the decision to disable the anonymous shopping feature, evidence is mounting that political considerations motivated the decision,” the committee said in the letter.
The letter was signed by Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), and subcommittee chairmen Reps. John Mica (R-Fla.), James Lankford (R-Okla.), Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Blake Farenthold (R-Texas).