Yet More Corruption Involving the ACA Web Site

I stumbled upon the following information while researching to find out what many are wondering: Why was the ACA website contracted out to a Canadian firm when we need jobs so desperately here in the U.S.?

Turns out that the Obama Administration apparently looked at a single bid for the contract to build this farce. Think about that – one company made one bid, and the Obama Administration said, “Ok sure, you got it!” And apparently that bid was $515 million, not including the do-over, at an estimated total cost of over $1 billion.

Rather than open the contracting process to a competitive public solicitation with multiple bidders, officials in the Department of Health and Human Services' Centers for Medicare and Medicaid accepted a sole bidder, CGI Federal, the U.S. subsidiary of a Canadian company with an uneven record of IT pricing and contract performance.

CGI Federal is “a U.S. subsidiary of a Canadian company”. To me, this simply means “a Canadian company using loopholes in order to funnel our tax money to Canadian millionaires. Like so many things in Washington, it may be legal, but that’s only because highly-paid lobbyists got paid to make the law bend in that direction, not to mention that it’s highly unethical.

It gets worse. CGI was apparently fired by the Canadian Government for screwing up their website so badly.

Canadian provincial health officials last year fired the parent company of CGI Federal, the prime contractor for the problem-plagued Obamacare health exchange websites, the Washington Examiner has learned.

CGI Federal’s parent company, Montreal-based CGI Group, was officially terminated in September 2012 by an Ontario government health agency after the firm missed three years of deadlines and failed to deliver the province’s flagship online medical registry.

Having dealt with government contractors in the past, I know that you have to really screw up to have your contract ended. That’s because first, no one in the government wants to admit that they made a multi-million dollar mistake. Second, the process to find another company and have them find and fix the screw-ups takes time that the hiring agency doesn’t have, and third, if the second company proves no better than the first, heads will roll. Plus, as we all know in more cases than not, someone’s good friend/relative/campaign fund provider is a big muckety-muck in said company and is getting a favor returned. More on that later.

In addition to all of this, The ACA website is using 10-year old technology, according to a USA Today article.

The federal health care exchange was built using 10-year-old technology that may require constant fixes and updates for the next six months and the eventual overhaul of the entire system, technology experts told USA TODAY. The site could be perfect, but if the systems from which it draws data are not up to speed, it doesn't matter, said John Engates, chief technology officer at Rackspace, a cloud computer service provider. According to FOX News, this should have come to no surprise to the Obama Administration, as this is nothing new with regard to CGI.

And according to FOX News:

"In projects stretching from Canada to Hawaii, parent company CGI Group and its subsidiaries ran into complaints about its performance," Fox reported. "The morning I heard CGI was behind [Healthcare.gov], I said, my God, no wonder that thing doesn't work," said James Bagnola, a Texas-based corporate consultant who was hired by the Hawaii Department of Taxation (DOTAX) in 2008.

One of the biggest complaints of people who were actually able to get far enough is that they have to enter all of their personal information just to get insurance quotes. This is the bottleneck which is causing the issues with the website, and according to forbes.com is by design.

And according to Forbes.com:

O bamacare's Website Is Crashing Because It Doesn't Want You To Know How Costly Its Plans Are

Growing consensuses of IT experts, outside and inside the government, have figured out a principal reason why the website for Obamacare’s federally-sponsored insurance exchange is crashing. Healthcare.gov forces you to create an account and enter detailed personal information before you can start shopping. This, in turn, creates a massive traffic bottleneck, as the government verifies your information and decides whether or not you’re eligible for subsidies.

So this brings us back to the question, “Why did this obviously incompetent Canadian company get a no-bid contract to build a web site for an American government program in the first place?”

Why would this company be considered so qualified by the Obama Administration to undertake what turned out to be such an enormous task without even bidding against any competition? No doubt no veteran ATSer will be surprised at the answer, so let’s get the obvious one out of the way.

George Schindler — President, U.S. and Canada, of CGI Group, the Canadian parent company of U.S. subsidiary, CGI Federal — donated $1,000 to Obama’s reelect ion campaign in Aug. 2012.

Nothing unusual there. Apparently this guy Schindler is a little politically confused, because he also donated the same to Romney’s campaign. “Just in case”, I guess. In and of itself, the above has come to mean nothing in the political arena, however it goes beyond that.

Maybe, just maybe, the fact that CGI’s Senior Vice President, Toni McCall Townes-Whitley, being Michelle’s good friend and former Princeton classmate had a little something to do with it. According to her own Facebook Page, they spent a very pleasant Christmas together.

Townes-Whitley and her husband even enjoyed “Christmas with the Obamas” at the White House in December 2010, according to a Facebook album created by Townes-Whitley.

Source: Dailycaller.com

Apparently this debacle hasn’t affected the growth of CGI in the least. Just check out their “Careers Page” page and scroll down the enormous list of openings.

It just goes to show you how a little brown-nosing with the right people can contribute to your success at great expense to the American taxpayers, and as in this case, American jobs.

And so it goes.

This is kind of old hat. (Been posted a few times on the forum). But check your numbers, as CGI I believe reportedly only got 70-90 million of the contract.

Yes indeed though, they boondoggled a 2 billion dollar deal in Canada for legislation that never came to pass. Not so much about funnelling into "Canadian Millionaires" pockets so much is it I think for funnelling kickbacks back to whoever hires them out of the government.

The fact that this company was used is a major red flag…

reply to post by boncho


You may be correct about the cost of the web site itself, however total payment according to NY Magazine is for all IT related work having to do with Obamacare, not just the web site.

All contracts between CGI and the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the arm of HHS that is charged with implementing the Affordable Care Act, inked since mid-2010 were for Obamacare IT work. The total value of the contracts meeting that description... is $515 million.

There are several estimates around the web, some up to a billion dollars, and I'm sure that's a very exaggerated figure, but I went with the most prevalent I could find. I doubt we'll ever know for sure, but I edited the OP to reflect this figure. Thanks for pointing that out.

Imagine where America would be, if this corrupt government wasn't standing in our way. One day out of necessity we'll have to push it aside, and only then will we start making real progress, as a people and a nation.

reply to post by seasoul


There was a time when this was at least mostly true, and we became an economic might that the rest of the world envied. Corporate corruption slowly worked its way into government, and got us where we are today.

Our government only exists today to feed corporations a perpetual supply of money and power.