{"id":31343,"date":"2024-01-27T12:42:04","date_gmt":"2024-01-27T20:42:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=31343"},"modified":"2024-01-27T12:42:05","modified_gmt":"2024-01-27T20:42:05","slug":"how-big-pharma-is-fueling-a-radical-maga-agenda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2024\/01\/27\/how-big-pharma-is-fueling-a-radical-maga-agenda\/","title":{"rendered":"How Big Pharma Is Fueling a Radical MAGA Agenda"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Tim Dickinson and Andrew Perez\/Rolling Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"HowRepublicans\u2019 Project 2025 blueprint is an assault on women\u2019s health care. It would also end Biden\u2019s Medicare drug-pricing plan (photo: AFP)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

26 january 24<\/strong> (RSN.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Republicans\u2019 Project 2025 blueprint is an assault on women\u2019s health care. It would also end Biden\u2019s Medicare drug-pricing plan<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Big Pharma has invested big money in the organizations planning what a MAGA policy agenda will look like in a new Trump administration. Not surprisingly, that policy playbook contains a major gift for the drug industry: a swift end to the Biden administration\u2019s landmark program to allow Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For two decades, Congress barred Medicare from negotiating prescription drug prices, which is a major reason why Americans pay higher prices for drugs<\/a> than anyone else in the world. In 2022, Democrats finally passed legislation creating a price negotiation pilot program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The same year, Washington\u2019s top drug lobby \u2014 Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, or PhRMA \u2014 donated $530,000 to groups involved with the far-right Project 2025 agenda<\/a>. The agenda, which is meant to serve as a policy roadmap for the early days of a new Donald Trump presidency, includes a call to repeal the new provisions allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The provisions are one of the most popular achievements of the Joe Biden presidency, with 76 percent of Americans supporting Medicare drug-price negotiations, including two thirds of Republicans. Only 6 percent of Americans outright oppose the policy, according to recent polling<\/a> by the Associated Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So it\u2019s not surprising that Big Pharma would fund front groups willing to wage an unpopular battle to boost drug manufacturers\u2019 bottom lines \u2014 PhRMA has long done so with organizations on both sides of the aisle. However, the lobbying group\u2019s donations to the organizations behind Project 2025 implicates the pharmaceutical industry in an extremist conservative plan that calls for eliminating access to the abortion pill, allowing states to ban hospitals from providing emergency abortion care, and ending protections for LGBTQ+ Americans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe engage with different groups who have a wide array of different policy opinions and priorities,\u201d says Alex Schriver, a senior vice president of public affairs at PhRMA. \u201cWe may not agree on every issue, but we believe engagement and dialogue is important to promoting a health care policy environment that supports innovation, a highly-skilled workforce, and access to life-saving medicines.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PhRMA\u2019s 2022 tax return \u2014 the most recent available \u2014 reveals the group donated $125,000 directly to the Heritage Foundation, the heavyweight conservative group that is spearheading Project 2025 and its agenda. But that agenda was produced in collaboration with an advisory board<\/a> of other right-wing political groups, many of which received PhRMA dollars as well in 2022, the year work on Project 2025 began.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These donations include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n