EU News Digest Latest News & Updates
Getty Images
U.S. Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin talks to reporters in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House May 31, 2017 in Washington, DC.
IG investigators had referred Wright Simpson’s conduct to the Justice Department for possible criminal prosecution. But the DOJ declined to bring charges.
When the report was released Wednesday, Shulkin was contemptuous of its findings, saying, “I have done nothing wrong.”
“The report is not accurate, not objective,” Shulkin told The New York Times that day. “I was horrified when I saw the way the investigator conducted himself.”
The Times also noted that Wright Simpson had denied the report’s conclusions, claiming that the dinner she had mentioned in the email justifying paying for Bari’s travel had actually occurred, and that she had not had a chance to review the report or respond to it before it was released.
But by the next day, while appearing before the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, Shulkin took a much different tone.
“I do recognize the optics of this are not good,” Shulkin said, according to The Washington Post. “I accept responsibility.”
Shulkin said he had written a check to the U.S. Treasury to cover the $4,300 cost of his wife’s travel with him last summer, as had been recommended by the IG’s report.
Shulkin also said he would follow another recommendation from the report, to pay for the Wimbledon tickets.
Later Thursday, Shulkin was reportedly summoned to the White House to speak with John Kelly, chief of staff to President Donald Trump.
The Post, citing a White House official, reported that at the meeting, “Shulkin defended himself … and sought to blame others within VA for not properly handling the trip’s preparations and its aftermath.”
