Senior House Representative Darrell Issa subpoenaed Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius for documents related to the launch of the Obamacare website, his office said Thursday, according to Reuters.
Issa, Republican chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said he and Republican Senator Lamar Alexander have been seeking documents regarding HealthCare.gov since Oct. 10, Reuters reported. The subpoena requires Sebelius to deliver the documents by Nov. 13.
The documents the two want to see contain information to the website's launch problems, how it was tested, the number of people who have enrolled in health care exchanges through the site and the number of Americans who have tried to enroll, according to Reuters.
Republicans have been attacking Obamacare since its inception and are jumping on the recent failure of the website to attack the law, according to Reuters.
Now, as thousands of people begin to receive health-plan cancellation notices asking them to sign up for a health care plan following the Affordable Care Act's new requirements, Republicans claim President Barack Obama is going back on his word of allowing Americans who like their current providers to keep them, Reuters reported.
But, the law stated beforehand that plans which do not include minimum benefits like maternity care and mental health coverage would be cancelled if changes were not made to meet the Care Act requirements.
Issa insisted in his statement that these cancellations were because HealthCare.gov was "entirely dysfunctional," adding it was putting Americans' personal information at risk, Reuters reported.
"The evidence is mounting that the website did not go through proper testing, including critical security testing, and that the administration ignored repeated warnings from contractors about ongoing problems," Issa said in his statement, according to Reuters.
Issa's claim about personal information comes from the fact HealthCare.gov collects information such as Social Security numbers, emails, phone numbers and birth dates. A government memorandum dated Sept. 27 stated the security of the site was at risk due to lack of testing before enrollment, Reuters reported.
According to a government spokeswoman, since the memo was published, the security concerns have been dealt with and consumer data is secure, Reuter reported.
While Sebelius was testifying on Wednesday before a House oversight committee, the Obamacare site was not functional, but the Department of Health and Human Services reported it was working on Thursday.
Verizon Terremark, which is operating the data services hub that serves the website, has reportedly solved the latest glitch, according to Reuters.
"Verizon Terremark has successfully resolved their issue with the networking component overnight and HealthCare.gov and the Data Services Hub are now working normally," Health and Human Services said in a statement.
