Lander held on to vaccine maker stock months into tenure
Nothing shady about this Actual science takes a backseat to profiteering.
By ALEX THOMPSON
02/09/2022 04:30 AM EST
Serving as Biden’s top science adviser, Eric Lander, the head of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, publicly promoted Covid-19 vaccination efforts while having a significant financial investment in one of the vaccine makers, according to financial disclosures.
Under the White House’s ethics agreement Lander signed, he had 90 days to divest his stocks after he was confirmed by the Senate on May 28. While Lander shed the bulk of that stock in June — including shares of BioNTech SE, the German biotechnology company and Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine partner — he waited until Aug. 5 to sell the remaining $500,000 to $1 million worth of stock he held in that company. When Lander ultimately sold the stock 69 days after his confirmation, it was the company’s second-highest stock price ever at $404.92 a share, having shot up more than $50 a share from two days prior.
cont @ link: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/0...thics-00007100
“When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.” Edumnd Burke