Dr. Harold Bornstein said he felt “raped” after White House aide Keith Schiller and lawyer Alan Garten showed up unannounced and took Trump’s files.
In February 2017, a top White House aide who was Trump’s longtime personal bodyguard, along with the top lawyer at the Trump Organization and a third man, showed up at the office of Trump’s New York doctor without notice and took all the president’s medical records.
The incident, which Dr. Harold Bornstein described as a “raid,” took place two days after Bornstein told a newspaper that he had prescribed a hair growth medicine for the president for years.
In an exclusive interview in his Park Avenue office, Bornstein told NBC News that he felt “raped, frightened and sad” when Keith Schiller and another “large man” came to his office to collect the president’s records on the morning of Feb. 3, 2017. At the time, Schiller, who had long worked as Trump’s bodyguard, was serving as director of Oval Office operations at the White House.
“They must have been here for 25 or 30 minutes. It created a lot of chaos,” Bornstein said, who described the incident as frightening.
A framed 8×10 photo of Bornstein and Trump that had been hanging on the wall in the waiting room now lies flat under a stack of papers on the top shelf of Bornstein’s bookshelf. Bornstein said the men asked him to take it off the wall.
Bornstein said he was not given a form authorizing the release of the records and signed by the president —known as a HIPAA release — which is a violation of patient privacy law. A person familiar with the matter said there was a letter to Bornstein from then-White House doctor Ronny Jackson, but didn’t know if there was a release form attached.
Bornstein said the original and only copy of Trump’s charts, including lab reports under Trump’s name as well as under the pseudonyms his office used for Trump, were taken.
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Bornstein said that Trump cut ties with him after he told the New York Times that Trump takes Propecia, a drug for enlarged prostates that is often prescribed to stimulate hair growth in men. Bornstein told the Times that he prescribed Trump drugs for rosacea and cholesterol as well.
The story also quotes Bornstein recalling that he had told Rhona Graff, Trump’s longtime assistant, “You know, I should be the White House physician.”
After the story ran on February 1, 2017, Bornstein said Graff called him and said, “So you wanted to be the White House doctor? Forget it, you’re out.’ “
Two days after the story ran, the men came to his office.
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Bornstein said he is speaking out now after seeing reports that Ronny Jackson, who has allegedly been called “the candy man” for loosely prescribing pain medications as White House doctor, will not return to his post after being considered to run the Veterans Administration.
“This is like a celebration for me,” he said.
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- Discussion
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NEW: Exclusive: Trump doc says Trump bodyguard, lawyer "raided" his office, took medical files. https://t.co/U4CW0Xv2H5
— NBC News (@NBCNews) May 1, 2018
JUST IN: Trump's former doctor says Trump bodyguard, lawyer "raided" his office, took medical files, @NBCNews reports in an exclusive.
Watch footage of @annaschecter's interview with the former Trump doctor. pic.twitter.com/tNB1CRiMnt
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) May 1, 2018
This guy is his own brand of garbage. He signed his name to a ridiculous statement that Trump obviously wrote about his health during the campaign. That aside, he never should have been talking about Trump’s health issues without Trump’s permission. That was a violation of patient/doctor confidentiality.
So I guess I don’t have much sympathy for the guy. When you willing cooperate with a thug I guess you shouldn’t whine when the thug gets mad and acts like, well, a thug.
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