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By Suzanne Blake
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A nonprofit litigation center is accusing the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services of withholding documents from the public, a new lawsuit shows.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), which is the agency responsible for overseeing the implementation of Medicare, is alleged to have withheld documents in a lawsuit filed on July 16 by Government Accountability & Oversight, which calls itself a "nonprofit public interest group" that "supports litigation that seeks to ensure that governmental entities at state, local, and federal levels comply with their sunshine and transparency obligations under open records acts."
Under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), government agencies are required by law to provide access to federal records to the public. The lawsuit states that CMS and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) improperly denied a FOIA request by "failing to provide an initial determination" and "produce responsive records." The initial request was June 12.
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The original FOIA request from Government Accountability & Oversight asked for copies of "certain described emails" of three named officials containing particular keywords over a specific period of time.
CMS and HHS allegedly did not give the group any estimate on the volume of records in response to the FOIA request and also didn't offer a date for when the records would be made available.
Under FOIA rules, government agencies must respond to requests within 20 working days and include a determination of whether the agency intends to comply with the request and provide reasons for this determination.
CMS and HHS did neither of those by the 20-day deadline of July 12, prompting the lawsuit.
Previously, a group of senators asked for an audit of CMS after reports of a $2.7 billion Medicare catheter fraud ring, leading to roughly $60 million lost a year in Medicare funding.
"The victims of Medicare fraud are often the most vulnerable Americans," Senator Mike Braun, an Indiana Republican, said in a statement in March.
"I'm calling for a full audit of Medicare so we can get to the bottom of the rampant fraud, waste, and abuse. It's beyond alarming that this recent case of alleged Medicare fraud involving overbilling for urinary catheters went undetected for over a year and accounted for an additional $2.7 billion in taxpayer spending. American seniors deserve better."
The current lawsuit might end with the court ordering the information to be released, but CMS could also decide to hand over the documents.
Correction 8/6/2024 at 12:30 p.m. ET: This story was corrected to show that the lawsuit was filed by the nonprofit Government Accountability & Oversight and not the Government Accountability Office.
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