HHS SECRETARY RESIGNS AFTER CONTROVERSY OVER FLIGHTS

Despite reimbursement, health secretary resigns over expensive trips

Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price resigned Friday in the midst of an expanding controversy over spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money for private air flights.

His departure was announced in a terse statement by the White House.

“Secretary of Health and Human Services Thomas Price offered his resignation earlier today and the President accepted,” the statement said.

Price, a former congressman, was one of four Cabinet members facing questions about private and military airplane flights.

Until Friday night, he had been resisting Democratic calls for his firing. Politico had reported, in stories that unfolded over days, that Price had spent more than $400,000 on private domestic travel in recent months. He spent an additional half a million dollars on military aircraft for events in Europe and Africa.

Washington — President Donald Trump’s health secretary resigned Friday, after his costly travel triggered investigations that overshadowed the administration’s agenda and angered his boss. Tom Price’s regrets and partial repayment couldn’t save his job.

The Health and Human Services secretary became the first member of the president’s Cabinet to be pushed out in a turbulent young administration that has seen several high-ranking White House aides ousted. A former GOP congressman from the Atlanta suburbs, Price served just eight months.

Publicly, Trump had said he was “not happy” with Price for repeatedly using private charter aircraft for official trips on the taxpayer’s dime, when cheaper commercial flights would have done in many cases.

Privately, Trump has been telling associates in recent days that his health chief had become a distraction and was overshadowing his tax overhaul agenda and undermining his campaign promise to “drain the swamp” of corruption, according to three people familiar with the discussions who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The flap prompted scrutiny of other Cabinet members’ travel, as the House Oversight and Government Reform committee launched a governmentwide investigation of top political appointees. Other department heads have been scrambling to explain their own travel.

Price’s repayment of $51,887.31 for his own travel costs and his public expression of regrets did not placate the White House. The total travel cost, including the secretary’s entourage, was unclear. It could amount to several hundred thousand dollars.

An orthopedic surgeon turned politician, Price rose to Budget Committee chairman in the House, where he was known as a fiscal conservative. When Price joined the administration, Trump touted him as a conservative policy expert who could write a new health care bill to replace the Obamaera Affordable Care Act.

But Price became more of a supporting player in the GOP’s futile health care campaign, while Vice President Mike Pence took the lead, particularly in dealing with the Senate. The perception of Price jetting around while GOP lawmakers labored to repeal “Obamacare” — including a three-nation trip in May to Africa and Europe — raised eyebrows on Capitol Hill. Price flew on military aircraft overseas.

Although much of Trump’s ire over the health care failure has been aimed at the Republican-controlled Congress, associates of the president said he also assigns some blame to Price, who he believes did not do a good job of selling the GOP plan.

A Pence protege, Seema Verma, has been mentioned as a possible successor to Price. Verma already leads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs health insurance programs that cover more than 130 million Americans.

Another possible HHS candidate: FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, who won some bipartisan support in his confirmation and is well known in policy, government and industry circles.

Trump named Don J. Wright, a deputy assistant secretary of health, to serve as acting secretary.