Quote:

---

"Obamacare gives IRS access to personal health records"

During a recent floor debate, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor warned of dire consequences from the IRS implementing portions of Obamacare and collecting taxes to help pay for the health care reforms.

"The IRS will have access to the American people’s protected health care information," Cantor, R-7th, said Aug. 2.

We asked Cantor’s office for proof. His spokesman, Rory Cooper, cited a June 18 article in the conservative Breitbart.com about a rule issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The rule requires private companies participating in the exchanges to submit information about new customers to HHS so the agency can assure that these people have bought at least the minimum levels of coverage required by the ACA and verify those receiving federal assistance buying their policies fall into qualifying income categories.

HHS officials repeatedly have said they will not be seeking intimate details from medical histories and guaranteed the department will not share the information with the IRS, as reported by this spring by our colleagues at PolitiFact National* and FactCheck.org**.

IRS officials will not have access to private medical records. The agency’s website states, "Nothing in (Obamacare) allows the IRS to access individual’s health information, including information about individuals’ health status and any health care services received."

The IRS will share tax information to help HHS determine whether low-income families and individuals qualify for assistance in purchasing insurance. A computer system is being developed that will give HHS instant access to that information. But it will be a one-way system, and the IRS will not be able to view HHS records.

"Taxpayers will get a form at the end of every year from their insurer to use when they prepare their tax returns," then-IRS Deputy Commissioner Steven Miller told a House subcommittee in September 2012. "It is important to note that the information that insurers provide to the IRS will show the fact of insurance coverage, and will not include any personal health information."

Our ruling

Cantor said that under Obamacare, "the IRS will have access to the American people’s protected health care information." But he offers no hard proof, just speculation on a blog.

The IRS will play a major role in Obamacare by collecting a variety of taxes that will help support the program. But contrary to Cantor’s claim, IRS officials will not have access to the intimate details of anyone’s health records.

Cantor’s unfounded statement does nothing more than amp up public fear for his ongoing fight to repeal Obamacare. We rate it Pants on Fire.

http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2013/aug/19/eric-cantor/
cantor-says-obamacare-gives-irs-access-personal-he/]

---

Quote:

---

* Michelle Bachmann: The IRS is going to be "in charge" of "a huge national database" on health care that will include Americans’ "personal, intimate, most close-to-the-vest-secrets."

We’ve already rated two of her claims from this exchange, which came during a May 15, 2013, interview on the Fox News show On the Record with Greta Van Susteren. We gave Bachmann a False for saying that the IRS is "going to be in charge of our health care," and we gave her a Mostly False for her claim that "The IRS will have the ability potentially" to deny or delay health care.

In this item, we’ll focus on whether it’s correct to say that the IRS is going to be in charge of "a huge national database" on health care that will include Americans’ "personal, intimate, most close-to-the-vest-secrets."

After the interview with Van Susteren aired, Dan Kotman, a spokesman for Bachmann, told PolitiFact that she stands by her charge. As evidence, he cited a passage from a Wall Street Journal editorial published one day before her television appearance.

The editorial described a Federal Data Services hub that is taking "the IRS's own records (for income and employment status) and centralizing them with information from Social Security (identity), Homeland Security (citizenship), Justice (criminal history), HHS (enrollment in entitlement programs) and state governments (residency). The data hub will be used as the verification system for ObamaCare's complex subsidy formula. ...

First, is the government constructing a database? Second, will the IRS be "in charge" of it? Third, would it include "personal" or "intimate" details?

We’ll take these issues in order.

Is the government constructing a database?

Not by the traditional definition of "database." The "hub" the government is creating is a mechanism for extracting data from a variety of databases that exist at other agencies. The hub doesn’t collect, centralize and store data; it is designed to allow real-time access to data that resides on the servers of other agencies in order to verify transactions related to the health insurance exchanges created under Obama’s law.

"The hub will not store consumer information, but will securely transmit data between state and federal systems to verify consumer application information," the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, a part of HHS, said in their statement.

"This is not a huge national database of health records," said Deven McGraw, director of the health privacy project at the Center for Democracy and Technology, which advocates for Internet freedom.

Will the IRS be "in charge" of the hub?

No. It’s being built by HHS, specifically by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. To ensure compatibility, the IRS needs to cooperate with HHS on the effort, but the IRS has only a supporting role in building the system, and the IRS will not be able to use the hub to view information in the other agencies’ databases.

Will the hub include "personal" or "intimate" details?

The hub is not designed to access, much less store, information like body mass index, or whether you have a serious illness or ingrown toenails. The hub will be able to tell if someone has insurance or not, but it will not access records about their health. It could access other "personal" details beyond health status, including adjusted gross income and Social Security numbers, but those already exist in federal databases, so the hub wouldn’t represent an expansion of federal data collection.

Our ruling

Bachmann said the IRS is going to be "in charge" of "a huge national database" on health care that will include Americans’ "personal, intimate, most close-to-the-vest-secrets."

The congresswoman chooses to believe that the IRS and the rest of the government intend to delve ever-further into Americans’ personal lives. She has mischaracterized the intent and limitations of the hub. It’s not a "database." The IRS isn’t running it. It won’t include "intimate" health data. And most Americans won’t need to interact with it at all. We rate her comment Pants on Fire.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2013/may/20/michele
-bachmann/michele-bachmann-decries-huge-national-database-ru/]

---

Quote:

---

** Republican Overreach on IRS

While there has been plenty to find fault with in the revelation that the IRS targeted some tea party groups seeking tax exempt status, some of the Republican rhetoric has been an overreach.

--Rep. Michele Bachmann falsely claimed that Americans “most personal, sensitive, intimate, private healthcare information is in the hands of the IRS,” while raising the specter that the IRS will misuse that information against “political opponents of this administration.” The IRS will not have access to personal health records.

--Sen. Rand Paul passed along baseless speculation that “the person running Obamacare” was the one “who wrote the policy” at the center of the IRS controversy. That’s a reference to a former IRS commissioner of the office responsible for tax-exempt organizations who now heads the IRS’ Affordable Care Act office. But a Treasury Inspector General’s report found that employees the Cincinnati office, not any administrators in Washington, “developed and implemented” the policy in question.

Bachmann’s Overreach

Quote:

---

Bachmann, May 20: When people realize that their most personal, sensitive, intimate, private healthcare information is in the hands of the IRS that’s been willing to use people’s tax information against political opponents of this administration, then people have pause and they pull back in horror.

---

But Health and Human Services and IRS officials have repeatedly explained that the IRS will not have access to anyone’s personal medical records.

“The IRS will not have access to personal health information. Application for financial assistance will be part of applying for coverage on the Marketplace and will take place in near real time.”

This isn’t the first time we’ve dealt with such a claim at FactCheck.org. Back in November we looked into a claim from the conservative group Americans for Tax Reform that under the health care law, taxpayers will have to disclose “personal identifying health information” to the IRS to prove they have insurance ( http://www.factcheck.org/2012/11/groups-obamacare-tax-form-evades-fact
s/).

In congressional testimony in September, then-IRS deputy commissioner Steven Miller made it clear that the IRS will not collect any personal health information.

Quote:

---

Miller, Sept. 11, 2012: Taxpayers will get a form at the end of every year from their insurer to use when they prepare their tax returns. It is important to note that the information that insurers provide to the IRS will show the fact of insurance coverage, and will not include any personal health information.

---

Last year, the IRS proposed the types of information insurers must submit to the IRS in 2015 — and they don’t include personal health details.

The agency proposed asking insurers for the following:

--The name, address and Social Security Number or Tax Identification Number of the taxpayer and any dependents.

--Dates the insurer provided coverage.

--Whether the insurance is considered “qualified” under the law, which means it covers a number of broadly defined health benefits, among other requirements.

--Whether the individual bought insurance through an affordable insurance marketplace, known as a health insurance exchange.

--Whether the individual is eligible for tax credits and other assistance to help pay for coverage.

Paul’s Unfounded Speculation

Quote:

---

Paul, May 19: There’s rumors that who wrote the [IRS] policy [to scrutinize tea party and other conservative groups] is the person running Obamacare, which doesn’t give us a lot of confidence about Obamacare.

---

He’s referring to Sarah Hall Ingram, who served as the IRS’ commissioner for the Tax Exempt and Government Entities Division for a portion of the period under the IG’s review. Ingram is now the director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act office (so not “running” Obamacare, just overseeing the IRS end).

More importantly, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration’s report makes no suggestion that Ingram “wrote the policy” that resulted in the IRS targeting conservative groups seeking tax exempt status.

The IG’s report concluded the policy, or directive, wasn’t written by administrators in Washington, D.C., but rather, “The Determinations Unit [in Cincinnati] developed and implemented inappropriate criteria in part due to insufficient oversight provided by management. Specifically, only first-line management approved references to the Tea Party in the BOLO [be on the lookout] listing criteria before it was implemented.”

According to the report, Lois Lerner, the IRS’s director of the exempt organizations division — a position under Ingram — “immediately directed that the criteria be changed” once she learned about it in June 2011.

At worst, the report suggests that perhaps Ingram can be criticized for failing to provide management guidance, but not for writing the policy, as Paul suggested. http://www.factcheck.org/2013/05/republican-overreach-on-irs/

---