As a member of Congress, Tom Price pushed legislation that benefited companies he owned stock in. As Health and Human Services secretary, Price has found a new way to live well off his government position. Why fly commercial when a government-chartered private plane is so much more comfortable? Rachana Pradhan and Dan Diamond report that a Politico investigation turned up at least 24 flights costing a total of more than $300,000 that Price had taken since May. President Obama’s HHS secretaries flew commercial, but not Tom Price:
HHS officials have said Price uses private jets only when commercial travel is not feasible.
But many of the flights are between large cities with frequent, low-cost airline traffic, such as a trip from Washington to Nashville that the secretary took on June 6 to make a morning event at a medication distributor and an afternoon speech. There are four regular nonstop flights that leave Washington-area airports between 6:59 a.m. and 8:50 a.m. and arrive in Nashville by 9:46 a.m. CT. Sample round-trip fares for those flights were as low as $202, when booked in advance on Orbitz.com. Price’s charter, according to HHS’ contract with Classic Air Charter, cost $17,760. [...]
Price took a Learjet-60 from San Diego to the Aspen Ideas Festival — a glamorous conference at the Colorado resort town — that arrived at 3:33 p.m. on Saturday afternoon, June 24, nearly 19 hours before his scheduled panel. That flight likely cost more than $7,100, according to one charter jet agency estimate.
The Washington Post followed up, finding that one of the planes Price recently flew on had its own kitchen along with the comfortable leather seats. But don’t worry, Price’s spokesperson offered an air-tight reason for his absolute need to fly in private jets rather than with the common people: one time, a flight delay made him miss an event. And if he misses events, he misses out on “getting outside of D.C., making sure he is connected with the real American people.”
Yeah, taking a private jet to be sure you arrive 19 hours early to the Aspen Ideas Festival just SCREAMS “connected with the real American people.” What about the real American people he could meet if he took a middle seat in coach and talked to his neighbors?