Trump’s CDC Director Steps Down After Tobacco Stock Scandal

Fitzgerald resigns four months after ex-HHS Secretary Price
CDC director’s conflicts called her standing into question

Stacks of rolled LD Ultra-Slim brand cigarettes sit on the production line ahead of packaging at the Japan Tobacco Inc. (JTI) cigarette plant in Senta, Serbia, on Wednesday, Nov. 29, 2017. As he prepares to take the reins as Chief Executive Officer of Japan Tobacco Inc., Masamichi Terabatake said this week that the world's fourth-largest tobacco seller had become too inward-looking and pledged to take more risks.Photographer: Oliver Bunic/Bloomberg

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By Anna Edney

January 31, 2018 at 3:03 PM UTC

Updated on

January 31, 2018 at 5:22 PM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

One of the Trump administration’s top public health-officials resigned on Wednesday amid an uproar over her investments in tobacco, the nation’s leading cause of preventable death.

The exit of Brenda Fitzgerald as the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is another black eye for the U.S. Health Department, which last year saw the departure of then-health secretary Tom Price after it was revealed that he had traveled extensively on private jets at taxpayer expense.