After the 2016 election losses, most people in the Democratic Party understood that if they wanted to remain politically relevant, they’re going to have to break their ties with corporations. Apparently, some people, including New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, did not get that memo. Just last week, Senator Bernie Sanders introduced an Amendment that would have allowed the U.S. to import cheaper prescription drugs from Canada, but the Bill was ultimately killed, when 13 corporate controlled Democrats voted against it.
Mike Papantonio, host of America’s Lawyer, discusses this with Farron Cousins.
Transcript of the above video:
Mike Papantonio: For more on this, let’s go to Farron Cousins, Editor of The Trial Lawyer Magazine. Farron, this is a shocker, and unfortunately, you don’t see media covering this. The Democrats voted to keep prescription drugs at a higher price. That’s the simple story here. They wanted consumers to pay more. Is that right?
Farron Cousins: That’s absolutely right. There’s no other way to frame this story, other than these 13 Democrats, led by Cory Booker, essentially, decided that, you know what? It’s more important that we give big pharma everything that they want, instead of standing up for the consumers, instead of learning the lessons from the 2016 election losses, when corporate Democrats got hammered, they decided they’re going to all in on this idea of being in favor of corporations, in favor of voting against American consumers.
Mike Papantonio: Farron, right now, we have people trying to make decisions. Should they take the prescription drug or should they eat? Can they buy their prescription drug or can they pay their mortgage payment? And Cory Booker, knowingly, he understands exactly what’s happening in this country. He led a charge of 13 Democrats that you just saw up on that screen to say, “We don’t care, consumers. We’re going to do what we want to do.” Did I overstate that or what? It’s just an outrageous concept, to me.
Farron Cousins: No, you didn’t Cory Booker knows the facts. He knows that 72% of the American public is in favor of lowering prescription drug prices. Bernie Sanders got 12 hardline Republicans to join him in supporting this Bill. Ted Cruz, John McCain, Grassley, people like that, actually voted in favor of what Cory Booker voted down. These 13 Democrats turned their backs on the American public, and with Booker, he comes from New Jersey. That’s where a lot of prescription drugs in the United States are manufactured. He is the third top recipient of corporate big pharma money over the last six years and he’s only been in office for two years, so in two years, he caught up with people who’d been getting big pharma money for four years.
Mike Papantonio: Farron, let me just close this by saying, it’s even worse than that. After the Democrats caved in for consumers, you had Schumer coming out and say, “This was the Republicans’ fault.” He actually tweeted to the American public and said, “This was because of the Republicans.” In fact, he understood that the Wall Street Democrats lined up, not on behalf of consumers, but on behalf of fat cat pharmaceutical salespeople, where they mark-up drugs as high as 2,000% and 3,000%. Those are the people that this guy, who believes he wants to be the next President of the United States, Cory Booker, he’s the guy that led that charge and we better not forget that going forward.
