New York Quietly Ends $250 Million Discriminatory Vaccine Passport Mobile App, Citing Reduced Demand

On Friday, New York State officials declared that they are discontinuing the contentious mobile phone vaccine passport program, known as the “Excelsior Pass.” The decision was made in response to the alleged “reduced demand for access to digital COVID-19 test and vaccine records.”

“As of July 28, 2023, the Excelsior Pass Plus (EPP) and the NYS Wallet Apps will no longer be available,” according to the news release.

“Following the reduced demand for access to digital COVID-19 test and vaccine records through the epass.ny.gov portal and the official end of the COVID-19 public health emergency on May 11, 2023, the NYS Wallet that hosts the Excelsior Pass Plus COVID vaccine credential, will be discontinued,” it added.

It claims that all “data collected for Excelsior Pass Plus continues to be private and secure.”

The Excelsior Pass program, which was initiated in early 2021, began with an estimated cost of $2.5 million. According to The Dossier, the actual costs of the program swelled to nearly one hundred times the original budget.

State records show that a staggering sum approaching $250 million has been allocated to IBM, Deloitte, and Boston Consulting Group to manage the program.

Deloitte and Boston Consulting Group have billed New York taxpayers approximately $200 million for “marketing” and “buildout” costs associated with the program since its inception. Simultaneously, IBM has billed around $40 million plus an additional $200,000 a month in “data storage” fees.

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Under mayors Bill de Blasio and Eric Adams, the city enforced its “Key to NYC” vaccine passport program for over two years. The mobile application was a staple of New York City’s movement pass system, which was installed to prohibit entry to indoor facilities to those who refused to take the experimental genetic serums released by Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson.

According to the Times Union, the taxpayer money that flowed to Excelsior Pass development “is now the subject of a state state inspector general’s investigation.”

This isn’t the first time that New York officials got into hot water over Covid related contracts. Last year, New York Governor Kathy Hochul awarded a personal megadonor supporter with over $600 million in no-bid “PPE” contracts.