Tom Price, President Donald Trump’s secretary of health and human services, has flown private jets for government travel at least 24 times since May, costing taxpayers more than $300,000, according to a report by Politico on Thursday. Citing inside sources and HHS documents, Politico found that flying private jets rather than commercial flights has become the norm for Price. While Price’s office said he only flies private jets when commercial flights are not feasible, Politico found a number of regular commercial flights to Price’s travel destinations, at a fraction of the cost. His immediate HHS predecessors — Sylvia Mathews Burwell and Kathleen Sebelius — regularly flew commercial, Politico reported. “This shows a complete disregard for the expense to the taxpayer,” Walter Shaub, the former director of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics told Politico. Price has publicly vowed to crack down on wasteful government spending. And Price is apparently not the only top Trump administration official regularly taking private charter flights. A spokesperson for Linda McMahon, the head of the Small Business Administration, told Buzzfeed she occasionally uses private jets, and the Associated Press reported Education Secretary Betsy DeVos uses her personal private jet for work, at her own expense.
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