Congressman Ronny Jackson, a former White House doctor of Presidents Obama and Trump, “disparaged” subordinates and drank recklessly while traveling with the president, according to a new report released by the Pentagon on Wednesday. Jackson, a Rear Admiral, was initially chosen by Trump to be Secretary of Veterans Affairs – but his name was chosen after reports of his behavior while he was on paper.
Wednesday’s report detailed inappropriate conduct involving alcohol in two incidents and said it promoted a negative work environment. The Department of Defense’s Inspector General started the investigation of Jackson in May 2018 and interviewed 78 witnesses about Jackson’s conduct at the White House Medical Unit for the report.
Jackson, who now represents Texas’ 13th Congressional District, said in a statement that the report was politically motivated because he supported Trump. He said he takes his “professional responsibility regarding prescribed medication practices” seriously, adding: “I categorically reject any claim that I consumed alcohol while working.”
“I also categorically deny any implication that I was in any way sexually inappropriate at work, out of work or anywhere with any member of my team or anyone else,” said Jackson. “This is not me and what is alleged has not happened.”
The report says the two incidents involving alcohol misuse occurred during presidential travels while Jackson was in charge of providing medical care and treatment to US officials.
During a presidential trip to Manila in 2014, Jackson is accused of making inappropriate comments about a subordinate’s anatomy and knocking on his hotel room door while drunk in the middle of the night, saying “I need you”. When another subordinate came by to ask what he was doing, Jackson allegedly took the two subordinates to his room to take pictures of himself eating local street food.
The subordinate said Jackson’s conduct was “fraternal boy behavior,” according to the report. When asked what she thought when he allegedly said, “I need you” outside her door, she said that a Navy officer in Jackson’s position “shouldn’t be knocking on my door drunk in the middle of the night. telling me that he ‘needs’ me, no matter what he needs from me. “
The investigation report said that Jackson used Ambien during long official flights, and that witnesses raised concerns about Jackson’s potential inability to provide adequate medical care.
The report concluded that Jackson’s general conduct towards subordinates “discredited, belittled, intimidated and humiliated them”. Witnesses allegedly told investigators that Jackson called his subordinates names like “idiots”, “lazy f ** kers” and “motherf ** kers”. Only four out of 60 of his former subordinates said they had not tried, seen or heard Jackson screaming, shouting, cursing or disparaging subordinates, the report said.
After Jackson ended his service as the president’s doctor in 2018, Mr. Trump appointed him Secretary for Veterans Affairs. Reports of his conduct as a doctor led to the withdrawal of his appointment. Jackson retired from the Navy in 2019 and won a seat on the U.S. House of Representatives in Texas in 2020, following the retirement of Congressman Mac Thornberry.