Democrats' Prescription Drug Socialism Continues To Rob Patients of Cures

Floor Speech

"Tomorrow, the world-leading innovators that produce medical cures here in America will face yet another compliance deadline for Washington Democrats' price fixing scheme.

As I've discussed before, the so-called Inflation Reduction Act includes a price fixing mechanism that requires drug manufacturers to agree to a crooked negotiation process, pay an excessive fine, or take their drugs off the market.

By February 1st, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) are required to send each drug company a little Valentine's Day gift: their initial "maximum fair price' offer for each selected drug.

Calling this price fixing scheme a negotiation is like calling a bank robbery a transaction! In any fair negotiation, either party has the ability to walk away from a deal they don't like.

But in this case, if a drug company fails to agree to the "maximum fair price' determined by unelected bureaucrats in a government agency, the company has two options.

They can agree to pay an excise tax capturing up to nineteen-hundred percent of the drug's daily revenue. If not, the IRA would force them to withdraw entirely from participation in the Medicaid and Medicare programs.

So unsurprisingly, multiple drug makers have sued the federal government over the IRA's price fixing racket. The companies have argued that the IRA's requirements constitute an uncompensated taking of property in violation of the takings clause.

In response, my colleague from Vermont, Senator Sanders, decided to call the CEOs of these companies to testify before the Senate HELP Committee.

And the timing is no coincidence. As a recent editorial pointed out "Mr. Sanders doesn't want to negotiate, or conduct actual oversight. He wants to keelhaul the CEOs as punishment for suing the government.'

Of course, the ultimate victims are not the innovators, but the patients who will never receive life saving treatments. By one estimate, the incentives eliminated by this scheme would have delivered nine times as much funding for cancer research as then Vice President Biden's own 2016 Cancer Moonshot initiative provided.

The simple truth of the matter is that socialism doesn't work. The government can't wave a magic wand and make prices go down. And expressing anger about prices to a CEO won't lower prices either.

So perhaps instead of holding show trials on high prices, Washington Democrats might reconsider how their own reckless taxing and spending policies have created an economy that's failing innovators, patients, and working families, alike."

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