Adam Andrzejewski, who founded and led the government transparency watchdog Open the Books died on Aug. 17, according to news reports Tuesday.
Read MoreTransparency Advocate Adam Andrzejewski, Founder of OpentheBooks, Dead at 55
Tag: transparency
Voter Reference Foundation Sues New Mexico for More Transparent Voter Rolls
The Voter Reference Foundation (VRF) filed a federal lawsuit against Democrat Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver and Democrat Attorney General Hector Balderas in an attempt to secure more transparent voter rolls.
According to a press release from the group, they “filed a First Amendment lawsuit in federal court against top Democrat officials in New Mexico to ensure the public’s right to view public voter rolls is not blocked.”
Read MoreFDA Announces Postponement of Approval of COVID Vaccine for Babies and Young Children
Pfizer and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said Friday they are delaying their plan for Pfizer’s Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for its coronavirus vaccine for children under five years old due to insufficient data on the efficacy of a third dose.
Pfizer announced February 1 FDA had asked the drug company, and its partner BioNTech, to submit data on a COVID vaccine series for babies as young as six months old and young children up until age five.
Read MorePhill Kline Commentary: It’s Not Good When Public Officials Fear Transparency
Politics is getting in the way of government transparency, preventing the sort of accountability on which our governing institutions depend for maintaining public trust and legitimacy.
In Wisconsin and elsewhere around the country, public officials are steadfastly refusing to answer basic questions about their official conduct from the people’s elected representatives. These are not salacious questions about their personal conduct, or fishing expeditions designed to stir up political scandal. Legislators are merely seeking to better understand how appointed bureaucrats and elected officials administered the 2020 elections amidst a pandemic and an unprecedented, and in many cases unlawful, infusion of private monies into public election offices.
Pennsylvania’s Attorney General, for instance, has sued to block a legislative subpoena seeking voter information as part of an investigation of the state’s voter registration system, known as SURE. Even though there is ample precedent for disclosing this type of information, the AG’s lawsuit argues that it would violate citizens’ right to privacy, as though allowing lawmakers to access government records would automatically compromise the security of that information.
Read MoreCongress Wants to Make Big Tech Responsible for Online Speech
While there is agreement between large factions of both Republicans and Democrats that social media companies should be liable for certain third-party content hosted on their platforms, the parties differ on what that content should be, and why platforms should be liable in the first place.
Congress appeared no closer to finding common ground following a House Energy and Commerce hearing Wednesday, in which lawmakers considered several bills seeking to reform Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
“Wednesday’s hearing made clear that Republicans and Democrats have drastically different solutions to hold Big Tech accountable,” Republican Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, who serves as Ranking Member on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Republicans are fighting for free speech, while Democrats continue to push for more censorship and control. Bipartisanship will not be possible until Democrats agree that we need less censorship, not more.”
Read More‘It’s a Felony:’ A New Lawsuit, with Video Evidence, Alleges Delaware County, Pennsylvania Election Officials Destroyed Voting Records
A lawsuit alleging multiple violations of federal and state election laws as well as Pennsylvania’s “Right to Know” statute was filed in Pennsylvania Wednesday night, according to sources familiar with the litigation.
In early 2021, a whistleblower working for the Delaware County Bureau of Elections began inquiring why it was apparent to her that multiple documents pertaining to the Nov. 3, 2020 elections were being destroyed in the southeastern Pennsylvania county, the sources said. The name of the whistleblower has not yet been made public.
Read More‘Hard to Know Where Pandemic Relief Money Went,’ Admits Federal Spending Watchdog
This week’s Golden Horseshoe goes to a broad sweep of federal agencies for a systemic lack of transparency that is hampering efforts to monitor many billions of dollars in COVID-19 relief spending, according to a report by the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee.
The PRAC was established in 2020 by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act to “promote transparency and conduct and support oversight” of more than $5 trillion in pandemic relief funds.
In a report released Wednesday, the watchdog details its difficulty in determining how funds are being spent due to federal agencies’ poor reporting on the government spending website, USAspending.gov.
Read MoreWhitmer Vetoes Bill Exempting High Schools from Capacity Limits at Graduation
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) will not allow full capacity at high school graduation ceremonies this year, despite rapidly declining COVID-19 cases and deaths nationwide.
Thursday, she vetoed legislation that would have exempted high schools from the state’s 50 percent capacity limit on indoor gatherings, according to Detroit News.
Read MoreSurveys: 46 Million People Can’t Afford Health Care, Majority of Hospitals Not Providing Pricing Transparency
An estimated 46 million people — or 18% of the country — would be unable to pay for health care if they needed it today, a recent poll conducted by Gallup and West Health found.
In another survey by the Texas Public Policy Foundation, the majority of hospitals in the U.S. have yet to comply with a transparency ruling implemented this year that would help patients shop around for the most affordable prices.
Gallup’s findings are based on a poll conducted between February 15 and 21 among 3,753 adults with a margin of error of 2%.
Read MoreMichigan Business Groups Oppose Some House Health Care Reform Bills
A health care reform package the House passed Wednesday is creating a rift between the state’s business groups and the GOP.
Michigan business leaders formed a new Michigan Affordable Healthcare Coalition that aims to reduce health care costs without raising costs on small businesses.
In a Thursday afternoon press conference, business leaders voiced opposition to House bills 4346 and 4354, claiming they would raise health insurance premiums that are already a heavy burden for many businesses.
Read MoreWhitmer Faces Bipartisan Criticism over Lack of Transparency
Embattled Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), who faced backlash for her overbearing COVID-19 shutdown orders, and who is now facing scrutiny for her COVID-19 nursing home policies, has a new issue to contend with: growing calls for transparency from her administration.
“Michigan is not just out of the mainstream. We’re out of the universe, basically, on limiting the access for our citizens to better know how its government works,” state Sen. Jeremy Moss (D-Southfield) told Michigan Live.
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