The White House’s medical unit has a history of doling out prescription and non-prescription drugs and even controlled substances without maintaining records, revealing a pharmacy operation that occasionally provided the drugs to “ineligible White House staff,” a recent U.S. Department of Defense report found.
The bombshell, which was revealed in a January report, detailed increased incidents of negligent operations by the White House Medical Unit during Donald Trump’s presidency but also mentioned some issues during Barack Obama’s tenure.
A former official described a Trump White House “awash with speed” and Xanax, with staffers routinely ingesting stimulants during late working sessions, according to several news reports.
The anti-anxiety medication Xanax was also a popular, easily accessible drug during the Trump administration and other prescription drugs were distributed, Rolling Stone reported. In fact, two people with direct knowledge of the situation recalled senior officials getting Xanax from the medical unit and sharing it with colleagues.
“It was kind of like the Wild West. Things were pretty loose. Whatever someone needs, we were going to fill this,” one source told Rolling Stone.
Meanwhile, the federal investigation revealed the White House Medical Unit’s pharmacy operations had “severe and systemic problems” due to the unit’s failure to ensure pharmacy safety standards, Inspector General Robert P. Storch said in a press release.
The investigation was prompted by complaints to the Inspector General of the Department of Defense, citing issues like inadequate record-keeping and the overuse of brand-name medications instead of more cost-effective generic drugs. The unit made significant orders of drugs such as fentanyl, morphine, and ketamine.
In 2018, the Department of Defense received complaints about a senior military medical officer at the White House Medical Unit engaging in improper medical practices. The investigation involved site visits, meetings with officials, and interviews with over 120 individuals, including hospital administrators and military medical personnel, according to the report.
Some complaints were also related to pharmaceutical practices and patient eligibility at medicine facilities in the National Capital Region operated by the department.
The report found that the unit “dispensed prescription medications, including controlled substances, to ineligible White House staff.” It also pointed to systemic issues with the pharmacy operations under previous presidential administrations between 2009 and 2019. It revealed that the unit also lacked proper record-keeping and occasionally provided medications to individuals who were not legally entitled to receive them.
Overseen by the Department of Defense, the White House Medical Unit is staffed by active-duty military physicians, physician assistants, registered nurses, and other healthcare personnel.
U.S. Rep. Ronny Jackson, a Republican now representing Texas’ 13th District, was the physician in the White House to Obama and Trump before he left in 2018.
A spokesperson for Jackson told NBC News that he was not the director of the White House Medical Unit during the time the majority of records were provided for the report.
The spokesperson noted that Jackson served as the president’s chief medical adviser under Trump in early 2019, which was a health care policy role and “had no association or involvement with the White House Medical Unit’s clinical delivery of care.”
However, a Pentagon watchdog investigation into Jackson while he was the White House physician revealed inappropriate conduct, and he was demoted by the Navy from admiral to captain in 2022, The Washington Post reported.
The report from the Defense Department, which was released in March 2021, pointed to two incidents in which Jackson inappropriately used alcohol during presidential trips while he was leading efforts to provide medical care and treatment to U.S. officials.
