Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) is accusing a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) doctor, who is in charge of handling adverse reports from COVID-19 vaccine reactions, of deleting records.
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) officials are apparently struggling to find Dr. Tom Shimabukuro’s records in compliance with a subpoena from Johnson regarding vaccine safety information, according to the New York Post (NYP). Shimabukuro is the director of the CDC’s Immunization Safety Office.
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Johnson’s subpoena is said to be “a culmination of a multi-year fight to overcome the obstruction of the Biden administration to get unredacted records and data about the COVID-19 pandemic and the safety and efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines.”
“HHS officials recently informed me that Dr. Shimabukuro’s records remain lost and, potentially, removed from HHS’s email system altogether,” Johnson reportedly wrote in a letter to FBI Director Kash Patel, HHS watchdog Juliet Hodgkins and Attorney General Pam Bondi. “Dr. Shimabukuro’s potential mishandling of his official records is highly concerning.”
Johnson reportedly called on the HHS, FBI, and Department of Justice to investigate whether or not Shimabukuro or other federal health officials “deleted or destroyed official agency records.”
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“Federal agencies are required to manage their email records in accordance with the Federal Records Act…” the National Archives say.
The specific records that are missing remain unclear, according to the NYP. Johnson’s team was reportedly informed by the HHS that the department was having difficulty locating information that should exist and that Shimabukuro was responsible for.
“If the allegations regarding Dr. Shimabukuro’s mishandling of agency records are true, then it will certainly raise questions about the effectiveness of the HHS OIG’s [Office of Inspector General] oversight and cast doubt on whether the HHS OIG actually did what I asked it to do nineteen months ago,” Johnson said, per the Post.
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