President-elect Trump’s transition team asked CNN on Tuesday to retract a story the outlet had published one day earlier about past financial transactions involving Rep. Tom Price, Trump’s pick for secretary of health and human services.
“The Presidential Transition Team requests that CNN retract this blatantly false story,” officials wrote in a letter circulated Tuesday evening that laid out additional details surrounding Price’s introduction of healthcare legislation last year.
Price had come under fire Monday following a report that he had purchased stock in a medical device company, Zimmer Biomet, days before introducing legislation that benefited companies like it. He later received a $2,000 campaign contribution from Zimmer Biomet’s political action committee.
But transition officials noted in their letter that a financial broker at Morgan Stanley made decisions regarding Price’s portfolio, not the Georgia Republican himself.
And Price didn’t know about his modest holding in Zimmer Biomet when he introduced legislation that would affect the company, according to the timeline transition officials put forward.
The letter asking CNN to retract its story said the report “omitted facts and drew conclusions in an effort to attack President-Elect Donald Trump’s designee for Secretary of Health and Human Services, Dr. Tom Price.”
“The facts were available to CNN through House Financial Disclosure Filings. Mr. Price’s position on the Comprehensive Joint Replacement demonstration, which date back to fall 2015, is also a matter of public record,” the transition team’s letter continued, referring to Price’s work on the legislation he introduced shortly after his broker purchased the stocks in question.
Officials said Price had begun working on the bill months before the controversial transactions occurred.
Price is expected to face tough questions about his financial history during his confirmation hearing Wednesday.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest even encouraged Senate Republicans to join their Democratic colleagues in scrutinizing Price’s record during his final daily briefing on Tuesday.
