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      Big pharma has a powerful new shill, Kyrsten Sinema, fighting drug price reform | Andrew Perez and David Sirota

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      OpinionPharmaceuticals industryBig pharma has a powerful new shill, Kyrsten Sinema, fighting drug price reformAndrew Perez and David SirotaIn the 2020 election cycle, pharmaceutical political action committees suddenly funneled more money to her than they did the whole six years she served in the US House Mon 11 Oct 2021 06.18 EDTLast modified on Mon 11 Oct 2021 12.42 EDT“The pharmaceutical lobby is very savvy,” Representative Ro Khanna, Democrat from California, said earlier this week. “They pick the one or two people they need to block things, on the relevant committees or at the relevant time.”“It may differ from Congress to Congress,” explained Khanna, who is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “We try to get 90-95% [of the caucus]. They are focused not on 90% , but the blockers.”In the current Congress, Big Pharma appears to have zeroed in on Senator Kyrsten Sinema, Democrat from Arizona, as one of their lead obstructionists to help kill or gut the Democrats’ drug pricing plan. In the 2020 election cycle, pharmaceutical political action committees suddenly funneled more money to her than they did the whole six years she served in the US House.Pharmaceutical companies can charge up to four times as much in the United States for name-brand pharmaceuticals than in other countries, in part because Congress barred Medicare from using its bulk purchasing power to negotiate lower drug prices. President Joe Biden and most Democrats support lifting that prohibition in their reconciliation legislation, a move that would save hundreds of billions of dollars – but Sinema has emerged as the party’s most prominent opponent to the plan.Her heel turn on drug pricing is a dramatic shift. A one-time progressive activist, Sinema campaigned on lowering drug prices in her 2018 Senate race, and she was still calling on Congress to address rising drug costs as recently as last year, boasting on her Senate website that she was fighting to “ensure life-saving drugs” would be more affordable.But it’s clear now that the pharmaceutical industry has been courting Sinema for some time. Indeed, in March 2021, as pharmaceutical Pac money was flooding into her campaign coffers, drug lobbyists were already bragging to Beltway reporters that they may have found their lead blocker in Sinema.Sinema has studiously avoided giving the public any details about where she stands on virtually any of the policy proposals in Democrats’ reconciliation legislation – refusing to speak with activists, reporters, or even other Democratic lawmakers.We only know Sinema opposes Democrats’ drug pricing plan thanks to a Politico report, which cited anonymous “sources familiar with her thinking”. Sinema reportedly told Biden she opposes the party’s proposal and won’t support a weaker offering from conservative House Democrats either.With the Senate split 50-50, her opposition imperils the whole endeavor.It makes sense that Sinema would be reluctant to publicly explain her opposition to Democrats’ drug pricing plan – because she would sound absolutely ridiculous, like a craven hypocrite straight out of Veep.During her 2018 Democratic primary campaign, Sinema released a direct-to-camera ad noting that her family had struggled with healthcare costs when she was younger. “We need to make healthcare more affordable, with access to the lowest-cost prescriptions, and fix what’s broken in the system,” she said in the ad.Sinema’s 2018 campaign website featured similar language: “Kyrsten is committed to making sure Arizonans have access to more health care choices, low-cost prescription drugs, and high-quality, dependable coverage. As one of the most independent-minded members of Congress, she’s committed to working with anyone – regardless of party – to get it done.”In a 2019 Senate hearing on prescription drug prices, Sinema noted, “The issue I hear about most back home is the cost of health care.” She went on to cite several stories from Arizonans who contacted her office about their sky-high drug costs:
      There’s a gentleman in Mesa, Arizona, who is lucky enough to be insured. But he has seen the price of his medication, to treat a serious lung condition, increase nearly five times in just one year … He’s looked, but there are no generics available that could offer him any financial relief. A woman from Glendale, Arizona, worries about her husband who has a serious heart condition. But his medication costs more than $500 out-of-pocket for a three-month supply. So he refuses to fill his prescription, because he’s worried about how it would impact their family financially. Another Arizona woman struggles to afford her specialty cancer medication. Even though her medication is a generic, she still has to pay thousands of dollars out-of-pocket. And often spends hours on the phone just to understand the unexpected cost increases, and to research payment assistance options. And this, of course, is unacceptable.
      In February last year, Sinema published an op-ed declaring: “Congress must address the cost of prescription drugs. Today, even Arizonans who have insurance sometimes struggle to afford the medicine they need. That’s why I’m pursuing policies to ensure life-saving drugs like EpiPens and insulin are affordable and available to Arizonans, especially our senior citizens.”But by then, drug industry cash was already starting to flood into Sinema’s campaign account.In May 2020, Kaiser Health News wrote that Sinema had recently “emerged as a pharma favorite in Congress”, based on the fact that she had become “a leading recipient of pharma campaign cash even though she’s not up for re-election until 2024 and lacks major committee or subcommittee leadership posts”.According to Kaiser’s pharma contribution tracker, Sinema received $121,000 worth of campaign donations from pharmaceutical company Pacs in 2019 and 2020.For some context, that’s double the amount of drug company Pac money she received during the 2018 election cycle, when she was on the ballot running for Senate. It’s more cash than she had raised from pharmaceutical company Pacs during her entire congressional career to that point.Over the course of her career, Sinema has accepted more than $500,000 from executives and Pacs in the pharmaceutical and health products industries, according to data from OpenSecrets.By March 2021, Big Pharma wasn’t just quietly funneling money to Sinema; the industry was publicly signaling that the senator could be its lead blocker in the fight to prevent the government from negotiating drug prices.“Drug lobbyists see a potential ally in Democratic Sen Kyrsten Sinema, the Arizona moderate who has shown a willingness to break with her party,” Politico reported at the time.Then, early last month, a corporate front group called Center Forward bought $600,000 worth of television and radio ads promoting Sinema in Arizona. The ads touted her “independence”, and characterized her as “a bipartisan leader” in the mold of the late Senator John McCain.As The Daily Poster reported, Center Forward has been heavily bankrolled by Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), the powerful Washington drug lobby. Two Center Forward board members lobby for PhRMA, as well as drugmakers Amgen, Bayer, Gilead Sciences, Eli Lilly, Merck, Novartis and Sanofi.A few days after the ad campaign started, Sinema informed the White House that she opposed the party’s drug pricing plan.Now, senators are talking behind the scenes about ways they can water down the legislation to appease the drug industry, and a second Democratic holdout – Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, a longtime top recipient of drug industry cash – has emerged to help Sinema and Big Pharma block the way.For his part, Khanna said he has tried to reach out to Sinema. But though she was eagerly making herself available to her business donors opposing the reconciliation bill, she wasn’t interested in talking to the progressive congressman, even though he was one of the lead authors of the Medicare drug pricing bill.“I’ve never met with her,” he said. ‘I’ve offered. She didn’t want to.”
      David Sirota is a Guardian US columnist and an award-winning investigative journalist. He is an editor-at-large at Jacobin, and the founder of the Daily Poster. He served as Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign speechwriter
      Andrew Perez is a senior editor at the Daily Poster and a cofounder of the Democratic Policy Center
      This article was originally published in the Daily Poster, a grassroots-funded investigative news outlet
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      How to blow the whistle on Facebook – from someone who already did

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      FacebookHow to blow the whistle on Facebook – from someone who already did This April, Sophie Zhang told the world about her employer’s failure to combat deception and abuse. Her advice? No screenshots, lawyer up – and trust yourselfSophie ZhangMon 11 Oct 2021 01.00 EDTLast modified on Mon 11 Oct 2021 12.05 EDTTwo years ago, I did something I almost never do: I put on a dress. Then I dropped my phone and other electronics off at the home of friends who had agreed to tell anyone who asked that I was at their place the entire time, and headed to the Oakland offices of the Guardian for my first meeting with a reporter. How Facebook let fake engagement distort global politics: a whistleblower’s accountRead moreLeaving my electronics was a safeguard against possible tracking by my then employer, Facebook. The dress was an additional layer of alibi: I theorized that if anyone from work saw me and could contradict my first alibi, they might conclude that my unusual behavior was evidence of nothing more than an affair.That first, anxious meeting was the beginning of a lengthy process that would culminate in my decision – 18 months later and after I had been fired by Facebook – to step forward and blow the whistle on Facebook’s failure to combat deception and abuse by powerful politicians around the world.This month, another Facebook whistleblower, Frances Haugen, has come forward. After providing the Wall Street Journal and US government with thousands of internal documents showing Facebook’s internal research into its own harms, Haugen testified to Congress. Her testimony and revelations have captured the imaginations of the public, the press and Capitol Hill and raised hopes that regulators might finally act to rein in Facebook’s immense power.During her testimony, Haugen encouraged “more tech employees to come forward through legitimate channels … to make sure that the public has the information they need”. But whistleblowing is never straightforward. When I was deciding whether to speak out, I struggled to find guidance on the best way to go about it. If you’re in that position now, here’s my best advice on how to navigate the complicated path to becoming a whistleblower.Decide what you’re willing to riskWhistleblowing is not for everyone; I knew Facebook employees on H1-B visas who considered speaking, but could not risk being fired and deported. Speaking out internally or anonymously to the press will risk your current job. Speaking out publicly will risk your future career. Providing documentation will risk lawsuits and legal action. These risks can be minimized, but not eliminated. Decide whether you’re going to go publicThe first question you have to ask yourself is whether your aim is to change the minds of employees and leadership, or to pressure them via public opinion? Employees will be more sympathetic to the company than the general public; an internal post denouncing the chief executive as intentionally undermining democracy might alienate your co-workers, but can move the window of discussion. Before I went public, I used Facebook’s internal message board, Workplace, to try to effect change. It was only when this failed that I decided to go to the press.If you do make an internal post, remember that leaks are inevitable, and consider how your words can be misunderstood. When I wrote my departure memo, I naively thought it would not leak, and wrote for an audience of insiders. One of the consequences of this was that a stray comment about “actors” (referring to people who take certain actions) resulted in incorrect reports in the Indian press that Bollywood stars were interfering with elections.Exhaust your internal optionsDon’t let the company claim that they were ignorant of the situation and issues you’re speaking out about, or allege that you had failed to speak to the right people. Even if you expect complaints to be ignored, consider making them nevertheless – in writing – so you can point to them later.Decide what you’re going to saySpeaking out about an area of personal expertise gives you credibility and insight, but narrows your scope to areas that may not arouse as much public interest. Speaking out about topics beyond your normal work will require you to conduct research and seek out internal documents you wouldn’t normally look at – creating a digital trail that could expose you – but could make your story more compelling. Be careful that what you say is correct and you aren’t making assumptions based on any personal bias or opinions; would-be “whistleblowers” have come forward with unconvincing revelations based on preconceptions.Facebook is ‘biased against facts’, says Nobel prize winnerRead moreExpect to face company criticism regardless of what you speak on – Facebook dismissed Haugen for speaking about issues beyond her scope, and attempted the same for myself even though I spoke only about topics I personally worked on.Whatever you speak about, consider what your end goal is and whether your revelations will accomplish that. Risking your career to help a tech reporter live-tweet a company meeting may not be the risk/reward ratio you had in mind.No screenshots, no work devicesNever contact outside parties (such as reporters or lawyers) via work devices; only do so via end-to-end encrypted systems like Signal on your personal devices. To securely copy work documents, use a personal device to take photos of the screen; do not take screenshots. If you’re accessing many documents, ensure that you have a plausible alibi. If leaking while employed, ensure that you’re only sharing documents that many employees have recently accessed. And if you intend to go public, insulate yourself beforehand by removing personal information online with a service like DeleteMe.Save up for a year without payIf you intend to go public with documentation, ensure that you’re able to survive off savings for at least a year. Most would-be-whistleblowers I’ve spoken to are concerned that they won’t be able to find another job. I worried about this too, but I’ve actually received many recruiting attempts – an experience also reported by others. Nevertheless, talking to the press, civil society and government officials is time consuming and will probably prevent you from working for some time. You will likely also incur additional expenses on lawyers and PR advice. Some whistleblowers choose to solicit donations, but this might undermine your credibility.Lawyer upIf you intend to go public with documentation and details, speak with a lawyer first. Organizations such as Whistleblower Aid and the Signals Network can help connect you with someone. By speaking out, you face the risk of lawsuits for breach of contract, or even prosecution in the United States for theft of trade secrets. These risks are unlikely, but the possibility exists nevertheless.Make contact with an outsiderMost tech reporters have a Signal address in their Twitter profile. I’ve heard many employees concerned that reporters will not protect anonymity – I personally have few concerns in that regard, although I would advise working with an established news outlet.When you do speak with a reporter, you should be clear up front about whether you’re speaking on the record (you can be quoted by name), unattributed (you can be quoted but not by name), or off the record (none of this can be published). If you intend to speak with the government, your lawyer should be able to help.It’s your decision – trust yourselfIn the end, whistleblowing is an intensely personal decision that very few will ever consider. It’s easy to criticize from the outside, but many feel differently when they face those risks themselves. Every time I advise others, I remind them that I can provide advice but the ultimate decision is their own. I am glad that I chose to come forward, and that Frances did as well, but no one is obligated to torch their career in pursuit of justice.TopicsFacebookSocial networkingUS politicsfeaturesReuse this content More