According to Dr. Harold Bornstein, the "raid" occurred two days after he told the New York Times about having prescribed a hair growth medicine called Propecia to the president for years. Bornstein also told the newspaper that he prescribes Trump drugs for rosacea and high cholesterol. Trump stopped seeing Borstein after his list of medications was released to the Times.
In a recent interview with NBC News, Bornstein said that he felt "raped, frightened and sad" when Trump's bodyguard, Keith Schiller, and Trump Organization chief legal officer Alan Garten came in to obtain the president's records.
"They must have been here for 25 or 30 minutes. It created a lot of chaos," Bornstein told NBC news.
"I couldn't believe anybody was making a big deal out of a drug to grow his hair that seemed to be so important. And it certainly was not a breach of medical trust to tell somebody they take Propecia to grow their hair. What's the matter with that?" Bornstein said.
In a recent interview with CNN, Bornstein also said, "I've been waiting, humiliated, for an entire year. How would you feel if you cared for someone for 35 years, they came and robbed your office?"
In addition, the men reportedly told Bornstein to take down the large framed photo of Bornstein and Trump that was hanging in the doctor's waiting room.
Bornstein told NBC news that he was not given a release form signed by the president, as required by federal privacy laws to safeguard medical information, which authorizes the release of such records. He also confirmed that Trump's original and only copies of lab reports were taken.
An anonymous person familiar with the situation said that during the "raid," a letter from Ronny Jackson, the White House doctor at the time, was given to Bornstein, although it is not clear whether the letter included a signed release form as well.
"If Ronny Jackson was the treating doctor, and he was asking for his patient's paperwork, a doctor is obligated to give it to him to ensure continuity of care," NBC News medical correspondent John Torres said. "But it has to be given in a secure fashion. Nobody who doesn't have HIPAA clearance [medical information release clearance] can see the patient records," Torres added.
NBC News legal analyst Danny Cevallos added that "New York state law requires that a doctor maintain records for at least six years, so a doctor who hands over his original records runs the risk of violating New York state law," Cevallos said, suggesting that Bornstein violated state law.
When NBC News' Hallie Jackson asked White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders about the incident on Tuesday afternoon, Sanders said that obtaining medical records was "standard operating procedure for a new president" and that it is inaccurate to refer to the encounter as a "raid."
"Those records were being transferred over to the White House Medical Unit, as requested," Sanders said.
In December 2015, during Trump's presidential campaign, Bornstein allegedly wrote a letter stating that Trump could be the healthiest president in history, adding that Trump's health is "astonishingly excellent."
Bornstein told CNN's Drew Griffin in September 2016 that he quickly wrote the letter before he rushed off to see patients. "I was just rushed for time. I had people to see. Did I really write that letter? Yeah," he said at the time.
On Tuesday, Bornstein changed his tune, telling CNN that he didn't actually write the letter himself. "He [Trump] dictated that whole letter. I didn't write that letter. I just made it up as I went along," he said.
