House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on HealthCare.gov billed as oversight, likely to focus on blame

Among those who will appear before the congressional panel will be Cheryl Campbell, senior vice president of CGI Federal Inc. She will likely be asked about the company's involvement in the bungled rollout of the online enrollment process.

Politico: Obamacare Hearings: Oversight Or Heckling?
There's congressional oversight that answers everyone's most urgent questions -- and then there's just heckling from the partisan peanut gallery. Over the next few weeks, Republicans are going to have to decide which path they're going to take as they open hearings into the broken Obamacare website (Nather, 10/24).

The New York Times: Contractors Assign Blame, But Admit No Faults Of Their Own, In Health Site
Contractors that built President Obama's health insurance marketplace point fingers at one another and at the government, but each insists that it is not responsible for the problems that infuriated millions of Americans trying to buy insurance on the Web site, according to testimony prepared for a Congressional hearing on Thursday (Pear, 10/23).

The Wall Street Journal: Executive To Defend Firm's Role In Health Site
An executive from the top contractor involved in designing the federal website consumers can use to sign up for health insurance is set to testify Thursday in Congress about the problems that have stymied the site. Cheryl Campbell, senior vice president of CGI Federal Inc., the U.S. unit of Canadian company CGI Group Inc., is expected to be asked about the firm's role in an enrollment process riddled with glitches that risk jeopardizing President Barack Obama's signature law (Nagesh, 10/23).

USA Today: Hot Seat For Health Care Exchange Website Builders
High demand for health insurance coupled with confusion between contractors led to many of the problems that have plagued the HealthCare.gov website meant to allow uninsured Americans to buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act, an official with the top contractor will say in prepared testimony to a House panel Thursday. Cheryl Campbell, senior vice president of CGI Federal, said in advance testimony for her scheduled Thursday appearance before the House Energy and Commerce Committee that another contractor was responsible for the technology that allowed users to create new accounts and which caused the initial bottleneck issues on the site (Kennedy, 10/24).

Fox News: Contractor Behind HealthCare.gov To Testify Extra Testing Could Not Have Saved Site
A top executive with CGI Federal, one of the contractors paid millions to create the ObamaCare website, says "no amount of testing" could have prevented the site's problem-plagued start. Senior Vice President Cheryl Campbell's remarks are part of prepared testimony she will give before a Republican-led House hearing Thursday on the insurance-marketplace site. They also appear to challenge new claims by the administration that a lack of adequate testing was part of the problem (10/24).

The Wall Street Journal: Contractors Point Fingers Over Health-Law Website
A new round of finger-pointing will kick off Thursday morning when a House committee grills four contractors involved in the development of HealthCare.gov, the troubled site where uninsured consumers are supposed to sign up for health insurance. CGI Federal, the lead contractor for HealthCare.gov, said the federal agency in charge of the project was "the ultimate responsible party for the end-to-end performance of the overall" health exchange, according to testimony released Wednesday by the House Energy and Commerce Committee (Schatz, 10/24).

Politico: Contractors To Explain Rough Rollout
Key Obamacare contractors testify before Congress on Thursday to explain the disastrous rollout of HealthCare.gov. It will be a much different scene from their previous trip to the Hill a little more than a month ago. Just three weeks before the health care law's troubled launch, four contractors assured a House panel that everything was on track for the Oct. 1 launch. According to written testimony posted Wednesday night, none of them are taking the blame for the website mess ahead of an expected grilling from the House Energy and Commerce Committee (Millman, 10/24).

The Associated Press: Website Contractors Blame Obama Administration
The principal contractors responsible for the federal government's trouble-plagued health insurance website say the Obama administration shares responsibility for the snags that have crippled the system. Executives of CGI Federal, which built the federal HealthCare.gov website serving 36 states, and QSSI, which designed the part that verifies applicants' income and other personal details, are testifying Thursday before the House Energy and Commerce Committee (Alonso-Zaldivar and Ohlemacher, 10/24).

NBC News: 5 Key Questions Await Developers Of Healthcare.Gov
It's against this tumultuous backdrop that officials of two of the main contractors hired to build the website -- CGI Federal, the lead firm on healthcare.gov with $300 million in contracts, and software maker QSSI -- will testify on Thursday. The executives can expect a rough reception, both from opponents of the law, who may try to get them to blame the website's woes on the complex law, and its defenders, who will likely try to deflect the blame onto the private firms. Here are five key questions the execs are likely to be grilled on, and some of the key issues they will have to explain (Aegerter, 10/24).