Danbury state Senator Michael McLachlan and other Republican Senators have filed a formal complaint with the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission about Insurance Commissioner Katharine Wade regarding a high profile proposed merger of Anthem and Cigna.
The lawmakers filed a Freedom of Information request in June, and Wade responded in July. But McLachlan says her response was missing multiple pieces of communication between the Insurance Commissioner and the Office of State Ethics.
They say nearly 500 pages of what another state agency has deemed to be public records were missing.
In the senators’ formal complaint, they say the refusal is without reasonable grounds and must be viewed as a bad faith attempt to keep secret the Commissioner’s potential conflicts. The lawmakers are asking that the Commission take the rare action of imposing civil penalties against Commissioner Wade and her Department.
Wade is a former Cigna vice president and her husband is currently a Cigna attorney.
Connecticut’s Citizens Ethics Advisory Board has agreed to review whether Wade should recuse herself from overseeing Anthem’s proposed merger with Cigna. Connecticut Common Cause asked the panel to issue a declaratory ruling on whether Wade should be disqualified. A Department of Insurance spokeswoman says Wade has sought guidance from state ethics officials throughout the process and “should that guidance change, she will follow that instead.”
