Revolving Door: DEA’s No.2 quits amid reports of previous consulting work for Big Pharma

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s second-in-command has quietly stepped down amid reporting by The Associated Press that he previously consulted for a pharmaceutical distributor sanctioned for a deluge of suspicious painkiller shipments and did similar work for the drugmaker that became the face of the opioid epidemic: Purdue Pharma. Louis Milione’s four years of consulting for Big Pharma preceded his 2021 return to the DEA to serve as Administrator Anne Milgram’s top deputy, renewing concerns about the revolving door between government and industry and its potential impact on the DEA’s mission to police drug companies blamed for thousands of American overdose deaths.