Trump’s White House had a big drug problem report claims

Donald Trump’s time as president was marked by the chaotic approach to policy that his administration brought to the executive branch of government, and it appears that all the chaos affected many of those working for the president.  

Uppers and downers were allegedly handed out like candy to officials serving the former president according to Rolling Stone's Nikki McCann Ramirez, who made her claim after the Department of Defense issued a report on the issue. 

Never miss a story! Click here to follow The Daily Digest.

In January 2024, the Department of Defense’s Office of the General Inspector published an 80-page document detailing how the White House Medical Unit was engaged in a lot of problematic behavior while Trump was the president. 

The report concluded the White House Medical Unit’s pharmacy operations “had severe and systemic problems” and stated that the unit relied on “ineffective internal controls to ensure compliance with pharmacy safety standards.”

“We found that the White House Medical Unit provided a wide range of healthcare and pharmaceutical services to ineligible White House staff in violation of Federal law and regulation and DoD policy,” the report went on to explain. 

“The White House Medical Unit dispensed prescription medications, including controlled substances, to ineligible White House staff,” the report said. But how did all of this begin and what do we really know about what was happening?

In 2018, the Office of the General Inspector received a complaint on its hotline alleging that a senior military officer in the White House Medical Unit was engaged in improper medical practices. But this was not the only complaint. 

The Department of Defense report noted several other complaints about practices and ineligibility of care had been filed with the Office of the General Inspector. This led to an investigation being opened into the issue in May 2018. 

Roughly one hundred and twenty officials were interviewed by investigators, including hospital staff, military medical providers, and pharmacists. The report looked at activity between 2009 and 2018 but also Trump’s time in office. 

Rolling Stone noted that the majority of the report's findings coalesced around 2017 to 2019, a period Nikki McCann Ramirez wrote was around the height of Trump’s time in office. But what was being proscribed and to whom?

 “While Trump lived under the White House roof, the pharmacy reportedly kept messy, handwritten records, spent lavishly on brand-name medications, and failed to comply with a slew of federal law and Department of Defense regulations,” wrote McCann Ramirez. 

At the height of Trump’s presidency, the White House Medical Unit spent $46,500 on 8,900 units of the brand name version of Ambien, which was $270 more per unit than the generic version of the drug according to Reuters. 

White House Medical Unit also ordered 4,180 unit doses of a popular stimulant called Provigil for a total of $98,000. Both Ambien and Provigil were given to patients without verifying their identities and the medications weren’t properly tracked. 

“It was kind of like the Wild West. Things were pretty loose. Whatever someone needs, we were going to fill this,” one unnamed source explained about the situation according to Rolling Stone, suggesting other controlled substances were available. 

Unfortunately, the report did not reveal how many pills had been given away while the former president was in office, but the General Inspector’s investigation into the issue “highlighted an open secret” according to Rolling Stone.  

Four former senior officials and others who knew about the matter were interviewed for the investigation they revealed stimulants were routinely provided to people when they needed them. One official told Rolling Stone the White House was “awash in speed.”