Now that Texas Children’s Hospital’s sterilization practices on minors have been exposed, the state of Texas has taken action and Attorney General Ken Paxton has opened an investigation into the medical center.
This follows a second whistleblower coming forward yesterday and alleging that TCH medical professionals had committed Medicaid fraud within the sex-change program.
Investigative journalist and Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute Chris Rufo confirmed with a spokesperson for the attorney general that Paxton is currently investigating the Medicaid fraud at the hospital. According to Rufo, the only two possible avenues for the investigation are civil and criminal.
“If the state pursues a civil case against Texas Children’s, the hospital could lose a significant amount of funding and, in the maximal outcome, even lose access to the state Medicaid program,” he explained. However, “If the state decides to pursue criminal charges, the doctors involved could face significant fines and up to 10 years in prison.”
The TCH saga stretches back to several years ago when the hospital flaunted public support for administering chemical castration drugs to children. After facing public pressure to discontinue the practices, CEO Mark Wallace announced that the program would be terminated.
However, whistleblower Dr. Eithan Haim—a medical professional finishing residency at the hospital—disclosed to the media that TCH was continuing to administer cross-sex hormones and puberty blockers to minors.
In June 2023, federal agents visited Haim, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Tina Ansari threatened him with prosecution. He was indicted this summer and the Biden administration subsequently unsealed the four-count charges alleging that he got hold of personal information of patient names, treatment codes, and the attending physician using the hospital’s electronic system without authorization.
After learning about Haim’s actions, a nurse at TCH named Vanessa Sivadge disclosed more information to Rufo revealing that doctors were encouraging confused patients to undergo sex change procedures. She was later visited by the FBI, which allegedly threatened her, saying she was “not safe” at work.
After some time had passed, she “learned that Texas law forbade hospitals from billing Medicaid for transgender procedures,” according to Rufo’s investigation.
“The Texas Medicaid Provider Procedures Manual has long stated that ‘sex change operations’ are ‘not benefits of Texas Medicaid.’ In 2021, Texas Medicaid officials told the Kaiser Family Foundation that this prohibition was not limited to genital surgeries but ‘explicitly excludes coverage of all gender-affirming health services.’”
Sivadge later came to discover that an alarming number of “transgender” teenage patients were under the care of two doctors named Roberts and Paul—who had allegedly been billing the state Medicaid program.
According to Rufo’s reporting, Paxton opened an investigation into the matter.
State Rep. Brian Harrison (R-Midlothian) has called for House Speaker Dade Phelan to hold an emergency interim hearing in response “to recent allegations of lawfare by Biden’s Department of Justice against whistleblowers exposing illegal and abusive sex-change procedures on Texas children and possible Medicaid fraud by Texas Children’s Hospital.”
“The Texas House must not sit idly by as the lawless Biden Administration potentially aids and abets CHILD ABUSE and MEDICAID FRAUD at Texas Children’s Hospital by prosecuting whistleblowers,” Harrison said. “I am formally asking Speaker Phelan to order an emergency interim hearing and launch an investigation – with subpoenas – into federal officials and hospital leadership. Texas must lead the nation in the defense of the next generation and state sovereignty by combatting the move to a post-constitutional America with every tool available to us. Inaction is complicity.”
