U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price resigned on Friday afternoon following reports that he spent several hundred thousand dollars at taxpayers’ expense flying charter planes, sometimes for personal as well as government business.
Price is a Roswell Republican who represented East Cobb in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2006 until his appointment in February by President Donald Trump.
He is the first Trump cabinet member to step down from his position, although the administration has been unsettled by several firings and resignations within high levels of the White House staff.
Price served less than eight months in that role. He was succeeded in Congress by Karen Handel, who won a June special election against Democrat Jon Ossoff in what’s been regarded the most expensive U.S. House race in history.
Last week Politico first reported about Price’s plane travel, leading off with a government-funded trip to St. Simons Island, on the Georgia coast, for a medical conference. In all, Politico reported, Price took at least 26 trips on charter aircraft, which are far more expensive than commercial planes.
On Thursday Price said he would partially reimburse the federal government for his plane usage, which included military aircraft, reportedly after Trump expressed displeasure with the news.
Price, who also served in the Georgia State Senate, was an orthopedic physician before his political career in Washington.
A former House Budget Committee chairman, Price was the lead administration official in charge of White House efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, and which has run into Republican opposition in the Senate.
