Day 252: Why Hasn’t Trump Fired Tom Price Yet?
Hundreds of thousands of dollars in private travel in less than a year and Trump can only muster a “we’ll see” what happens.
Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price has taken dozens of private flights to cities across the country, some business-related, others mixed with personal affairs. But the American taxpayers are footing the bill, according to Politico.
Richard Painter, who served as the top ethics official for President George W. Bush, said Price’s trips may have been legal but were ethically dubious.
“To use a charter flight on something that combines personal and government business, I think it’s highly unprofessional and really inappropriate,” Painter said — especially if personal business represented a disproportionate part of the trip.
HHS has long maintained that Price, whose use of chartered aircraft is under investigation by the HHS inspector general, has not violated Federal Travel Regulations, which state that officials can charter a plane only if “no scheduled commercial airline service is reasonably available (i.e., able to meet your departure and/or arrival requirements within a 24-hour period, unless you demonstrate that extraordinary circumstances require a shorter period) to fulfill your agency’s travel requirement.”
As the report notes, charter flights are okay if commercial flights are not reasonably available.
But Politico found plenty of options for many of Price’s flights.
The Nashville trip offered even more commercial options. On June 6, Price took a Learjet 55 — a $17,760 round-trip flight, according to a federal contract — that departed from Washington Dulles International Airport at 9:12 a.m. ET and touched down in Nashville at 9:44 a.m. CT.
Two commercial flights that morning followed similar itineraries. An American Airlines plane departed Reagan National Airport at 9:05 a.m. ET and landed in Nashville at 9:39 a.m. CT. A Southwest Airlines flight left Baltimore-Washington International at 9:18 a.m. ET and arrived in Nashville at 9:54 a.m. CT.
Additionally, at a cost of over $25,000, Price flew round trip between Washington D.C. and Philadelphia, cities separated by less than 150 miles. There were ample commercial aircraft options. He could’ve taken the train. Or rented a car. Or Ubered.
But he didn’t; he flew in via private jet.
Price is living the high life on the taxpayers’ nickel to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars in less than a year on the job. For comparison, one of his predecessors, Kathleen Sebelius, in five years on the job, took just one private flight: to a remote outpost in Alaska where commercial flights were not an option.
When Donald Trump was asked if he would fire Price over the egregious spending he responded, “we’ll see.”
“I was looking into it and I will look into it. I will tell you personally, I’m not happy about it,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “I am not happy about it I’m going to look at it. I let him know it.”
However, a White House official said Wednesday that President Trump has “no immediate plans” to remove him from the Cabinet.
Price is not alone.
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt spent $58,219.19 on four military and private flights between February and August, according to information provided to a congressional oversight committee.
There is not an easier political move than firing government officials who take advantage of the power — and expense accounts — that they’ve been given. This is the definition of “the swamp” that Trump campaigned against and promised to drain. By allowing Cabinet members to rack up exorbitant tabs for things like the private plans and doing nothing about it, Trump is showing to be a hypocrite, yet again and allowing his administration to fill the swamp greater than ever before.
252 days in, 1210 to go
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