Health Secretary Tom Price Resigns After Drawing Ire for Chartered Flights
WASHINGTON — Tom Price, the health and human services secretary, resigned under pressure on Friday after racking up at least $400,000 in travel bills for chartered flights and undermining President Trump’s promise to drain the swamp of a corrupt and entitled capital.
Already in trouble with Mr. Trump for months of
unsuccessful efforts to repeal and replace President Barack Obama’s health care program, Mr. Price failed to defuse the president’s anger over his high-priced travel by agreeing to pay a portion of the cost and expressing “regret” for his actions.
In a statement, the White House said that Mr. Price “offered his resignation earlier today and the president accepted.”
It said Mr. Trump will tap Don J. Wright of Virginia to serve as acting secretary at midnight Friday. Mr. Wright currently serves as the deputy assistant secretary for health and as director of the Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion.
Mr. Price’s resignation came hours after Mr. Trump publicly dressed him down for the second time in a week and said he would decide whether to fire the secretary by the end of the day. “I’m not happy, O.K.?” the president told reporters before boarding a helicopter as he headed to his New Jersey golf club for the weekend. “I can tell you, I’m not happy.”
Mr. Price’s job was on the line ever since the
first of a
string of
reports by Politico on Sept. 19 about his extensive use of charter aircraft. Mr. Trump has fumed privately and publicly about Mr. Price’s actions, fearing that they undercut his promise to rid Washington of the sort of abuses that have soured the public on its political class. The president made clear on Friday that he also saw it as undermining his promise to save the government money, citing efforts to renegotiate contracts.
In a bid to assuage Mr. Trump, the secretary offered on Thursday to reimburse the government $51,887 of the $400,000 spent, which he said represented the cost of his own seat on the trips. But it was clear that was not enough to save his job.
Mr. Price, a career physician and former congressman who had long opposed Mr. Obama’s Affordable Care Act, had been a point man on the drive to scrap the law. In July, Mr. Obama said he would fire Mr. Price if he did not get the votes for the legislation. “He better get them,” Mr. Trump
told an audience with Mr. Price at his side. “Otherwise, I’ll say, ‘Tom, you’re fired.’”
He said it in a jocular fashion, and his audience at the time took it as a jest, but in fact the president has been privately fuming about Mr. Price over the unsuccessful efforts to pass health care legislation in the Senate. The
latest effort collapsed this week when enough Republicans defected to deprive Mr. Trump of a majority.
