Reps Roy, Norman launch effort to bring transparency on COVID FOIA requests

Press Release, Office of Rep. Chip Roy, Dec. 17, 2021

On Thursday, Rep. Chip Roy (TX-21) and Rep. Ralph Norman (SC-05), joined by several of their House colleagues, introduced the Answer COVID FOIAs Now Act to require current outstanding COVID-related FOIA requests to be completed within 100 days. The introduction follows reports that the Public Health and Medical Professionals for Transparency (PHMPT) is suing the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for failure to produce requested documents via FOIA and asking to have until 2097 to do so.

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This bill would ensure expedited processing of COVID-related FOIA requests.

COVID-related FOIAs are those that relate to:

• A drug or medical device to treat, prevent, or mitigate COVID-19;

• Gain-of-function or potential pandemic pathogen (P3) research;

• A policy, rule, or standard requiring vaccination of individuals.

If agency heads fail to complete the requests within 100 days, a penalty of $1 million would be taken from the office of the head of the federal agency and transferred to the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program.

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Full text of the legislation is available at the link here.

See full press release here.