By Ellen Fike, Cowboy State Daily
(this story originally appeared on Cowboy State Daily)
Just one day after U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney blasted her congressional opponent for spreading misinformation regarding a bill she voted in favor of, another GOP representative criticized similar statements made by other Republicans, calling them “lies.”
The bill — The Immunization Infrastructure Modernization Act — would provide funds to improve existing immunization information systems in place in most states and improve the sharing of information.
House candidate Harriet Hageman on Thursday said the bill represents a “massive intrusion into most basic personal privacy” and criticized Cheney’s support for the bill in the House.
“This is straight out of George Orwell, and the fact that Liz Cheney thinks the federal government has the right to know your personal medical information to help Joe Biden enforce his unconstitutional mandates shows you that she has lost her mind,” Hageman said.
However, U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, a former Navy Seal and one of the most well-known younger members of Congress, posted a series of short videos to social media to debunk similar statements being spread in the Republican Party about the bill.
“Every Republican up here…knows that that particular bill, which was Republican-led, actually makes it harder to track vaccine information on the individual level,” the Texas Republican said. “It actually decreases the amount of money that originally allocated for these systems by the Biden administration.”
Crenshaw, like Cheney spokesman Jeremy Adler did on Thursday, clarified that immunization information systems have been in states for many years, but Republicans wanted states to use the money given from the federal government to make the vaccine data anonymous.
“So, the Republicans screaming about this bill, saying it’s bad, it does the exact opposite of what they’re saying, and they know that but they also don’t like explaining votes to you. That’s the truth,” Crenshaw concluded.
Cheney spokesman Jeremy Adler told Cowboy State Daily on Thursday that it was dangerous for Hageman to spread misinformation like she is.
“Harriet Hageman is a lawyer. She would know the truth about this bill if she read it. Did she read it? Or did she allow her advisors to send out a false press release that misinforms the people of Wyoming?” Adler said Friday.
For all things Wyoming, visit Cowboy State Daily online at cowboystatedaily.com and signup for the Cowboy State Coffee Break. Reprinted with permission of Cowboy State Daily. Copyright © 2021.
The Wyoming Department of Health provides COVID-19 case, variant, death, testing, hospital and vaccine data online. The department also shares information about how the data can be interpreted. COVID-19 safety recommendations are available from the CDC.
