The Senate Veterans Affairs Committee must find the truth about allegations against Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson, the White House physician and nominee to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs, Sen. Jon Tester said Wednesday.
"We need to be able to do our job and we need to get to the bottom of these accusations to find out if they are true," Tester, D-Montana, told CNN's John Berman on "Newsroom."
Four sources told CNN about an incident that involved an intoxicated Jackson banging on the hotel room door of a female employee. The incident became so loud that the Secret Service stopped Jackson over concern that he would wake then-president Barack Obama, the sources said.
"We've confirmed it with the people who told us and, quite frankly, moving forward we just need to do more to find the sources, to finding it out," Tester said.
On Tuesday, Tester told Anderson Cooper that about 20 people have come forward with allegations against Jackson, such as giving out prescriptions "like candy."
"The word is that on airplane trips, overseas trips in particular, the admiral would go down the aisle way of the airplane, saying, 'Who wants to go to sleep?'… and then give them drugs to wake them back up again."
"We were told time and time again the people above him he treated like gold, the people below him, he belittled, screamed at them, really created a very toxic environment," Tester told Cooper.
The White House offered defense for Jackson earlier Wednesday by releasing handwritten notes from then-president Barack Obama that praised Jackson.
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