Alex Azar
Alex Azar is an American attorney and former government official who served as the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under President Donald Trump from January 2018 to January 2021. Born on June 17, 1967, in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, Azar studied at Dartmouth College and Yale Law School, where he earned his law degree. He began his career in public service during the George W. Bush administration, where he held roles including general counsel and deputy secretary of HHS. Prior to his appointment as HHS secretary, Azar was an executive at Eli Lilly, a major pharmaceutical company, where he oversaw U.S. commercial sales and marketing operations.
As HHS secretary, Azar aimed to reduce drug prices and improve health insurance affordability, launching initiatives like the American Patients First blueprint. His tenure was marked by challenges, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, where he faced criticism for the federal response and testing delays. Azar's background in both government and the pharmaceutical industry has drawn scrutiny regarding his policies and actions, particularly concerning healthcare access and drug pricing. Outside of his professional life, Azar resides in Indiana with his family.
Alex Azar
US Secretary of Health and Human Services
- Born: June 17, 1967
- Place of Birth: Johnstown, Pennsylvania
Education: Dartmouth College; Yale Law School
Significance: Alex Azar served as general counsel and deputy secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) during the administration of President George W. Bush. A former executive of Eli Lilly, Azar replaced Tom Price as HHS secretary in the Donald Trump administration.
Background
Alex Azar was born on June 17, 1967, in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, to ophthalmologist Alex Azar and Lynda Azar. He was raised in Salisbury, in southeastern Pennsylvania, where he attended Parkside High School from 1981 to 1984. Foregoing his senior year, he attended Dartmouth College starting in 1984. From March to June 1986, he interned at the Health and Income Maintenance Division of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
At Dartmouth, Azar was a member of Phi Beta Kappa and received several other honors, including a Rockefeller Public Service Internship Grant and a Nelson A. Rockefeller Memorial Fellowship. He graduated from Dartmouth in 1988 with a bachelor’s degree in government and economics and then entered Yale Law School, where he received a juris doctor degree in 1991.
Legal Career
Azar began his career by working during the summers while in law school. He was a volunteer extern to Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski of the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Pasadena, California, from June to August 1989. During the next two summers, he worked as a summer associate to the Washington, DC firm Steptoe and Johnson, and spent part of the summer of 1990 as a summer associate at the New York City firm Sullivan and Cromwell. After completing his studies, he clerked for Kozinski from July to August 1991. He was a law clerk for Circuit Judge J. Michael Luttig of the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in McLean, Virginia, from October 1991 to June 1992. His next clerkship was at the US Supreme Court with Associate Justice Antonin Scalia from July 1992 to July 1993.
After his clerkships, Azar joined the private sector as an associate for Kirkland and Ellis in Washington, DC, in 1993. There he met Kenneth W. Starr, who became his mentor. After Starr became the independent counsel for the Whitewater investigation into the real estate dealings of President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton, Azar joined Starr as an associate independent counsel in the investigation, starting in October 1994. In the fall of 1996, Azar left the investigation and joined the Wiley, Rein and Fielding law firm in Washington, DC, as an associate. He was a partner in the firm from January 1999 through June 2001.
Political and Business Career
Azar worked on several political campaigns for Republican candidates beginning in the late 1990s. During the 2000 presidential campaign, he served as a volunteer attorney for the credentials committee of the Republican National Convention and a deputy to national co-chairman Richard E. Wiley for the Lawyers for Bush-Cheney. Following the election, Azar served on the Bush-Cheney recount committee and helped defend George W. Bush’s victory during a recount in Florida.
In June 2001, Azar served as a senior adviser to Tommy Thompson, secretary of HHS in the Bush administration. Azar subsequently served as HHS’s general counsel from 2001 to 2005. During Bush’s second term as president, HHS secretary Mike Leavitt promoted Azar to deputy secretary of HHS, a position he held until 2007.
After leaving HHS in 2007, Azar joined Eli Lilly, a global pharmaceutical firm, as senior vice president of corporate affairs and communications. In 2012, he was promoted to president of Lilly USA, the firm’s largest affiliate, where he was responsible for US commercial sales and marketing operations, which included setting prices for drugs. Azar left Eli Lilly in 2017 and then established a consulting company in Indiana.
In a November 2017 tweet, President Donald Trump nominated Azar as successor to HHS secretary Tom Price, who had resigned following charges of misusing government funds. Many Republicans lauded Azar’s nomination, citing his industry and government experience. Yet Azar’s critics in the Senate pointed to his record in industry. During Azar’s tenure as president of Lilly USA, the company raised the prices of many drugs, including doubling the price of Humalog, the brand-name version of a laboratory-produced insulin widely used to treat diabetes. In March 2017, Lilly was one of three drug manufacturers named in a class-action lawsuit that alleged the companies had colluded to fix insulin prices.
Azar was confirmed by the US Senate on January 24, 2018, in a 55–43 vote along party lines. He was sworn in as secretary of HHS on January 29, 2018. In March 2018, Azar announced his goals for HHS: to lower drug prices, establish more affordable and accessible private health insurance, ensure insurance payments are based on the quality of care versus the quantity of care, and address the opioid epidemic.
Impact
In May 2018, HHS rolled out the Trump administration’s American Patients First blueprint, which sought to reduce drug prices and consumers’ out-of-pocket costs. Azar cited its results to date in August 2018: two drug companies lowered or rolled back price increases, four canceled planned price increases, and thirteen froze prices for the remainder of 2018. Despite these successes, the website GoodRx, which tracks drug prices, reported that drug companies had raised the price of 255 drugs since Azar became secretary. Several drug companies cited by Azar had increased prices in 2018 prior to their promises to halt future increases for the rest of the year. A Bloomberg index released just a month before Azar’s comments showed many drug prices had increased by 25 to 40 percent since June 2015, when Trump announced he was running for president.
Azar sought to lower health insurance costs by expanding access to short-term, limited-duration health insurance plans that did not meet the requirements of the Affordable Care Act. He also supported plans to abolish the pre-existing condition insurance mandate and Medicaid waivers that require recipients to work to receive health care benefits. A federal judge ruled against one of these waivers, a Kentucky work requirement, in August 2018.
On January 18, 2020, Azar briefed Trump on the novel coronavirus disease and subsequently told several associates that Trump thought he was being “alarmist” and that he had a hard time getting the president to focus on the virus and efforts to prevent it from gaining traction in the United States. Instead, the president ignored Azar's warnings and said during a press conference that the US had the virus under control. By the end of January, Azar said that there was no need to declare a public emergency over the coronavirus. Furthermore, he told Trump that the coronavirus was under control and gave a glowing review of his department's efforts to contain it. In February, Azar prompted an outcry from Democrats when he told members of Congress that it would be best if the private sector developed a coronavirus vaccine, and that while HHS would work to make it affordable, he could not guarantee that all Americans would be able to afford it. By March, Azar was the target of criticism from those within and outside the Trump administration after faulty tests caused testing delays that greatly limited national testing capacity and an uncoordinated agency response failed to stop the spread of the virus.
In September 2020, Azar issued a memorandum to the leaders of Health and Human Services agencies, including the Food and Drug Administration, that declared the agencies could not sign any new rules concerning US foods, medicines, medical devices, or vaccines without his permission as secretary of the agency. Critics of Azar's memo saw it as a power grab and were concerned that it would add to the public perception of political interference with science-based regulatory processes and decisions. In January 2021, Azar submitted his letter of resignation, in which he condemned the attack on the Capitol earlier that month. The same year, he was also sanctioned by China. In 2022, Azar was subject to a lawsuit concerning COVID-19 mortality statistics. That same year, Azar became chair of the board of LifeScience Logistics, a firm that manages Florida's Canadian drug importation program. It was reported in Health News Florida that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis's government was paying the company about $39 million to buy drugs from Canadian suppliers.
Personal Life
Azar and his wife, Jennifer Reist Azar, have a daughter, Claire, and son, Alexander. The family lives in Indiana.
Bibliography
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Cunningham, Paige Winfield. “The Health 202: Azar Tells Staff Trump Wants ‘Big and Bold’ Health Care Changes.” The Washington Post, 28 Mar. 2018, www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/the-health-202/2018/03/28/the-health-202-azar-tells-staff-trump-wants-big-and-bold-health-care-changes/5ab9246230fb042a378a2e8a/. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
"Ealy et al v. Redfield et al." Justia, 2022, dockets.justia.com/docket/oregon/ordce/3:2022cv00356/165733. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
Glenzain, Jessica. “Trump’s Health Secretary Pick Pitches Himself as Opponent to High Drug Prices.” The Guardian, 29 Nov. 2017, www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/29/trumps-health-secretary-pick-pitches-himself-as-opponent-to-high-drug-prices. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
Galewitz, Phil. "Alex Azar's Unusual Spin Through the Revolving Door." KFF Health News, 12 Jan. 2024, kffhealthnews.org/news/article/health-202-alex-azar-drug-importation-canada/. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
Galewitz, Phil. "Trump Official Who OK'd Canada Drugs Chairs Company Behind Florida's Plan." Health News Florida, 13 Jan. 2024, health.wusf.usf.edu/health-news-florida/2024-01-13/trump-official-who-okd-canada-drugs-chairs-company-behind-floridas-plan. Accessed 2 Oct. 2024.
Goldstein, Amy. “Key Things to Know about HHS Nominee Alex Azar.” The Washington Post, 29 Nov. 2017, www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/key-things-to-know-about-hhs-nominee-alex-azar/2017/11/28/bc70aa70-d459-11e7-95bf-df7c19270879‗story.html. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
Kaplan, Sheila. “In ‘Power Grab,’ Health Secretary Azar Asserts Authority Over F.D.A.” The New York Times, 12 June 2021, www.nytimes.com/2020/09/19/health/azar-hhs-fda.html. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
Nominations of Alex Azar II, Timothy D. Adams, Suzanne C. DeFrancis, Charles E. Johnson, and Shara L. Aranoff. S. HRG. 109–265, United States Senate Committee on Finance, 24 May 2005, www.finance.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/25654.pdf. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
Pear, Robert. “A ‘Sick Joke’: Democrats Attack Health Secretary on Pre-existing Conditions.” The New York Times, 12 June 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/06/12/us/politics/alex-azar-pre-existing-conditions-drug-prices.html. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.