Trump Pardons GOP Lawmaker's Husband [View all]

President Trump has pardoned Tennessee Republican Rep. Diana Harshbarger's husband, who pleaded guilty more than a decade ago to health care fraud and other crimes and served time in federal prison.

Robert Harshbarger Jr. was a licensed pharmacist in 2013 when he admitted substituting a cheaper drug imported from China that was not approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for the iron sucrose that the FDA had approved for kidney dialysis patients to use. He was sentenced to and served four years in prison. He was also ordered to pay restitution, pay a fine, and forfeit $425,000 in cash.

A White House official defended the pardon for Harshbarger to the AP on Tuesday, saying that he was a victim of "excessive prosecution" and that the drug substitution he made was a common practice among pharmacists known as "compounding," in which unapproved drugs are provided to patients based on their condition or for other reasons. The official insisted on anonymity to discuss the reasoning behind Trump's clemency decision.

Harshbarger turned to the Chinese drug due to a backlog of the iron sucrose drug, the White House official said. No patients were alleged to have been harmed by the substitution, and doctors seemed to prefer the drug Harshbarger gave them because it was easier to administer, the official said.

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Rep. Harshbarger, who is also a licensed pharmacist, was first elected to the US House in 2020 and has been a strong supporter of Trump. She spoke in support of Trump outside his hush money criminal trial in New York in 2024 and in other settings.

https://www.newser.com/story/378501/trump-pardons-lawmakers-husband-for-health-fraud.html