VA Employees Caught Illegally Accessing Medical Records of Vance and Walz on One America News Network
OAN Staff James Meyers
12:00 PM – Monday, September 30, 2024
Multiple reports suggest that at least 12 Department of Veterans Affairs employees are reportedly accused of improperly looking at Vice Presidential candidates JD Vance and Tim Walz’s medical records in July and August.
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An estimated dozen or more employees had taken a peek at the sensitive medical files, causing an internal investigation into whether they violated federal health privacy laws, according to the Washington Post.
“We reported to law enforcement allegations that VA personnel may have improperly accessed Veteran records. We take the privacy of the Veterans we serve very seriously and have strict policies in place to protect their records,” VA Press Secretary Terrence Hayes told the New York Post.
“Any attempt to improperly access Veteran records by VA personnel is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.”
Additionally, Walz and Vance became the first pair of dueling military veterans running for vice president since 1996 when Republican Jack Kemp and Democrat Al Gore squared off.
Vance had served in the U.S Marine Corps between 2003 and 2007, while Walz spent almost 24 years in the National Guard before retiring to prepare for a congressional run in the 2006 cycle.
Walz has been called out by at least fifty Republican members of Congress, who claimed the Minnesota Democrat lied about his military record, including leaving the National Guard in 2006 before his artillery battalion was set to deploy to Iraq. He instead chose to pursue a career in politics.
Authorities uncovered the illegal activity last month during a routine review of the department’s high-profile accounts.
Additionally, officials at the VA notified the Harris-Walz and Trump-Vance campaigns about the breach, which entailed a contractor and a physician who are alleged to have reviewed those files for an extended period of time, according to the official report.
However, it’s not clear whether the perpetrators shared data from those medical records with any outside groups.
The report also stated that the people involved did not have access to disability compensation records, per the report.
“We reported to law enforcement allegations that VA personnel may have improperly accessed Veteran records,” VA Press Secretary Terrence Hayes said in a statement to Fox News Digital, regarding the report. “We take the privacy of the Veterans we serve very seriously and have strict policies in place to protect their records. Any attempt to improperly access Veteran records by VA personnel is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.”
The 1996 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act makes it illegal to get unauthorized access to an individual’s personal health data. Violations of HIPAA can actually result in up to a year in prison and fines up to $50,000.
Meanwhile, there are almost 400,000 individuals who operate in the VA medical system which supports over nine million veterans across the U.S.
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