A Texas judge on Friday temporarily blocked state Attorney General Ken Paxton from forcing an LGBTQ+ advocacy group to hand over information about transgender children receiving gender-affirming medical care.
The ruling came just one day after PFLAG National went to court to try to stop Paxton’s office from getting the information.
Travis County District Court Judge Maria Cantú Hexsel said in an order that providing the information would harm PFLAG and its members in several ways, including violating their rights of free speech, association and protection from unreasonable searches. Additionally, the judge said, it would be a “gross invasion” of privacy.
So… my first question was: Why’d they even want the information? It’s answered in the article:
In a statement Thursday, Paxton’s office said the information is highly relevant to investigations into whether medical providers are committing insurance fraud to circumvent the ban.
Ok… so they know something about the possibilities of insurance scams. I wonder how they know about the methods of insurance scams? Perhaps now would be a good time to investigate how Paxton knows so much about insurance scams.
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Former governor of Florida and professional Voldemort impersonator Rick Scott’s company committed the largest known case of insurance fraud in US history. He is currently a US Senator.
Also, it’s bullshit. They want to create a registry so when Trump gets in, they can put them in camps.
Why would the AG even care about alleged insurance scams? Isn’t that something for the insurance companies to figure out in civil court?
conservatives: privatize healthcare
also conservatives: no, not like this
Republicans are so creepy spying on kids all the time.
Texas very interested in children’s genitals, to the surprise of Noone.
Christians are pathologically obcessed with grooming children
Paxton has been on a shameless, vindictive speed run of vengeful terror since he survived impeachment.
I’m afraid this is but a microcosmic sampling of what’s to come if Trump gets back in the white house.
Wouldn’t it be a HIPAA violation too?
HIPAA doesn’t protect you from the government legally obtaining records. It’s a shield for patients against having their medical data leaked to the public in various ways. This situation is beyond terrifying, but HIPAA doesn’t apply here.
That’s exactly what I came here to ask. It’s got to be at the very least, a HIPAA violation.
States can get their hands on things for criminal investigations. Or they can get that data in the infectious disease database but usually that’s carefully anonymized into general steps of ten… But this… This is some messed up shit
Yeah totally get that for criminals, but these poor children are not breaking the law in any way!
Not yet but they will be if conservatives get their way
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Neither the state of Texas nor PFLAG are “covered entities” under the HIPAA privacy rule. It does not apply to this situation.
Ken Paxton should be in jail.
Ken Paxton should be under the jail.
Fascism!
- Texas, probably
Hopefully this will stop Paxton’s disgusting lawsuit against Seattle Children’s Hospital.
It’s an election year.
If someone decides to contribute to PFLAG or another advocacy group, that’s money that isn’t going to Biden and the Dems.
GOP actively tries to create small, powerless groups like this to sap money from their major threat.
Even better, they can use taxpayer money to drag people into court again and again.
There’s a major flaw in your logic. Money donated to advocacy groups doesn’t correlate to money that would’ve been donated to Democrats.
The Republicans do this to waste money, yes, but also to waste time and energy fighting battles that don’t need to be fought and arguing against positions that they don’t actually believe in (theoretically), while also giving their constituents targets to get riled up about and unite against in their joint hatred of said minorities.
It’s play #1 in the fascist handbook.
I cite the old saying, The Left falls in love, and the Right falls in line.
One person is going to get upset by book bans and focuses on that. Another beams in on LGBTQ+, while another is working on the environment.
Meanwhile, whatever issue is paramount to the Right, they know exactly who they are going to be voting for in November.
The GOP is about winning elections, and if they can distract us, they are winning.
Damn right, I say it all the time myself.
I just wanted to point out that there’s no direct link to donation money and campaign funds, and it’s only a part of the bigger picture of the strategy - the time and energy wasted, the infighting amongst leftists, and the unification of their voting bloc.
It’s why I always advocate for people to vote in local politics. Because Republicans sure do, and so much of this stuff starts at a local level and needs to be stopped at a local level long before it gets to the presidential race. They’re the ones voting people to school boards to ban books from schools and such. We need to stomp it out at the source rather than fighting fires after they’re already started.
key detail ken paxton was asking for information on people and treatments outside the state of Texas.
Paxton probably knows he can’t get this info due to HIPAA(?) but it’s still a pretty shitty thing, which is on brand for the GOP.
