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Are you a reporter or casual viewer wondering who Natalie Harp @NatalieJHarp , one of tonight’s featured convention speakers is? Then this thread is for you!
The RNC describes Ms. Harp as a Trump campaign board member, entrepreneur, and “ a beneficiary of President Trump’s 2018 Right to Try Act, which allowed her to try experimental drugs to combat her cancer” https://www.donaldjtrump.com/media/trump-campaign-previews-monday-speakers-for-historic-republican-national-convention
Her Right to Try story is how she initially received national attention and her connection to the Trump campaign. After posting her story to her LinkedIn account, which included a critique of Biden’s goal of curing cancer, Fox News picked up on the story https://www.foxnews.com/politics/millennial-cancer-joe-biden-trump-right-try-saved-life
This presumably led to an approving tweet by noted Fox and Friends fan @realDonaldTrump praising the story and Ms. Harp https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1139485397858291713
A few weeks later, Ms. Harp appeared on stage with @realDonaldTrump at a Faith and Freedom Coalition event where Ms. Harp recounted her story and stated “My Good Samaritan, President Donald J. Trump, he saw me there and he didn’t walk by, he stopped.”
In short, this is a feel-good story about Right to Try and Trump’s push to improve access to experimental treatments. This will undoubtedly be the topic of Ms. Harp’s speech tonight and linked to the administration’s push for emergency access to experimental COVID-19 treatments.
The thing is, though, like much in the Trump administration, Ms. Harp’s story seems to be false. In her initial description of her treatment, she states she received “an FDA-approved immunotherapy drug for an unapproved use” https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/im-living-proof-party-healthcare-trumps-natalie-harp-mba/
She repeats this language in an interview here, stating “I started looking at different doctors that would treat me in that way as well as FDA approved drugs for a non-approved use” https://www.foxnews.com/politics/millennial-fighting-cancer-thanks-trump-for-right-to-try-during-faith-conference-appearance
However, federal Right to Try only gives access to treatments that have “not been approved or licensed by the FDA for any use”. Instead, as she describes it, she received off-label access to an approved drug, something that long predates Right to Try https://www.fda.gov/patients/learn-about-expanded-access-and-other-treatment-options/right-try
Moreover, Ms. Harp was blaming the Obama administration for her illness and thanking the Trump administration (without evoking Right to Try) in March, 2018, two months before the federal Right to Try law was signed
Similarly, two months before Right to Try she explicitly thanks @realDonaldTrump for saving her life by speeding up the drug approval process.
So maybe she misspoke about whether the drug she received was FDA approved, misunderstands the Right to Try law and her use of it, or just got carried away in her enthusiasm for the Trump administration.
That excuse might work for the first press blitz but not for tonight. I wrote a piece last year flagging her case. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/trump-brags-that-hes-helping-patients-access-medical-miracles-he-isnt/2019/11/15/14690142-00df-11ea-8501-2a7123a38c58_story.html
During fact checking for it, @cshea4 and I reached out extensively to folks at the White House and directly to Ms. Harp to confirm these facts. They did not respond but they can’t claim that they don’t know about these questions and inconsistencies.
Tonight they will be willfully going on, doubtless presenting Right to Try as an enormous policy and personal success. But, with the facts as they are publicly available, that's just not true.
@DaniellaGeno states "after Trump signed the legislation into law, she [Ms. Harp] was allowed to explore experimental treatment opportunities as well as find new doctors and medications." As I've shown, this isn't true - I hope this piece will be corrected https://www.foxnews.com/politics/rnc-speakers-what-to-know-about-natalie-harp
Hi @AriFleischer, I some of the details of this "uplifting story" are a little off https://twitter.com/AriFleischer/status/1298069165086056449
@ASwoyer writes that "when the chemotherapies failed, Mr. Trump allowed patients like her to pursue experimental treatments through supporting “the right-to-try.”" It would be great to see a correction on this claim. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/aug/24/natalie-harp-touts-president-trumps-right-try-medi/
Some extra context for @barbarasprunt on Ms. Harp's "experience with Trump’s 2018 Right To Try Act, which she says allowed her to try experimental drugs to fight her cancer" https://apps.npr.org/liveblogs/20200824-rnc/share/natalie-harp-prewrite-54.html
@AndrewRomano, here's some more context undermining the claim that through Right to Try Ms. Harp "was then able to access an investigational immunotherapy drug". Also, thanks for referencing my work on this topic (through you misspelled my last name) https://news.yahoo.com/cancer-survivor-at-rnc-says-trump-saved-her-life-with-right-to-try-021754000.html
@claire_lampen nails it: "RTT has shown extremely limited success, and anyway, there’s little evidence that Harp ever received RTT therapies." https://www.thecut.com/2020/08/the-wildest-moments-from-the-2020-rnc.html
