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CVS pharmacy

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also a drug middleman corp

Each of the three conglomerates — UnitedHealth Group, CVS Health and Cigna-Express Scripts — is among the 15 largest corporations in the United States. Each owns a top-ten health insurer and each owns a pharmacy middleman known as a pharmacy benefit manager, or PBM.

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...In a letter sent to CVS (among other pharmacy chains), Mississippi Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith and eight other Republican senators (Lankford, Daines, Braun, Rubio, Marshall, Risch, Crapo and Blackburn) wrote that the Biden interpretation (and that of Congress in 1955, 1958, 1971, and 1994) is wrong.

They explicitly asserted that the Comstock Act is still in effect and they want it enforced:

“We write to express our support and agreement with 21 [Republican] State Attorneys General,” they wrote “who have reminded you that Federal law in 18 U.S.C. 1461-1462 [the Comstock Act] criminalizes nationwide using the mail, or interstate shipment by any express company or common carrier, to send or receive any drug that is ‘designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion.’”

The 1930 court ruling that lawmakers and judges had, for over 90 years, believed only applied the Comstock Act to items that were illegal (like child porn), Senator Hide-Smith wrote:

“[D]oes not protect CVS or any other individual or entity from being prosecuted within the five-year statute of limitations for the illegal mailing or interstate shipment of abortion drugs … even for conduct that occurs today.”

Keep in mind, under the plain language of the Comstock Act this could also apply to birth control pills, IUDs, and other things used to prevent pregnancy. And, of course, pornography and “masturbation devices” like vibrators.

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U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio wanted to slip a sweeping measure into a spending bill that would gut the Federal Trade Commission. Critics say it’s no coincidence that the FTC is suing mammoth health care conglomerates and tech giants like Amazon.

Jordan is chairman of the powerful House Judiciary Committee. Last week, it released a version of a bill that included tax cuts, federal spending cuts and more spending at the border.

It also contained provisions that would give Trump sweeping new powers to gut government regulations. It would also transfer funds and personnel currently controlled by the FTC to the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department — without the FTC’s unique enforcement authority going with them.

The measure was abruptly nixed, but it would have effectively killed antitrust powers Congress created more than a century ago.

The FTC history

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Amid abuses to consumers by big corporations, the Federal Trade Commission Act was passed in 1914. Antitrust enforcement by the Department of Justice dates back further, to 1903.

But the Justice Department is overseen by the attorney general, a presidential appointee. Attorneys general traditionally have had a high degree of independence, but Trump is said to be politicizing the Justice Department at a breakneck pace.

The FTC was created in part to be more independent. It’s governed by commissioners from both parties who are appointed to fixed terms that can be renewed.

Earlier this year, Trump tried to fire the two Democratic commissioners, but they say the move was illegal, and they’re fighting it in court. Antitrust advocates said Trump was doing that as a favor to his billionaire supporters such as Elon Musk.

The two Democratic commissioners, Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Slaughter, acted to block the Kroger-Albertson’s mega-merger, and they voted to sue Amazon, saying it is “illegally maintaining monopoly power.”

Under Jordan’s leadership, the Judiciary Committee in 2023 attacked the FTC on behalf of Musk. He’s the world’s richest man, whom Trump is allowing to make deep cuts to federal programs for the elderly, veterans, the poor, and agencies that promote science and health.

“THE WEAPONIZATION OF THE FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION: AN AGENCY’S OVERREACH TO HARASS ELON MUSK’S TWITTER,” read the all-caps title of the Jordan-led committee’s report.

A year earlier, the FTC had charged Twitter with using deceptively gathered data from users to target ads at them. If true, it would be added to the fact that an unofficial, Musk-run entity is now collecting much more sensitive government data. It’s raised concerns among several federal judges who said such collections invite abuse and likely violate the law.

“One of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency lieutenants working in the Social Security Administration has been pushing dubious claims about noncitizens voting, apparently using access to data that court records suggest (the so-called Department of Government Efficiency) isn’t supposed to have,” NPR reported earlier this month.

The proposal from Jordan to gut the FTC could have halted major initiatives to regulate giant health conglomerates that own powerful pharmacy middlemen, said Bedoya, one of the commissioners Trump is trying to fire.

Jordan’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment on this story.

PBMs

Each of the three conglomerates — UnitedHealth Group, CVS Health and Cigna-Express Scripts — is among the 15 largest corporations in the United States. Each owns a top-ten health insurer and each owns a pharmacy middleman known as a pharmacy benefit manager, or PBM.

Combined, the PBMs control nearly 80% of the insured drug transactions in the United States. They decide which drugs are covered and use that power toextractrebates from drugmakers. They also determine varying reimbursements to pharmacies — including ones owned by their parent companies as well as the pharmacies with which they compete. Critics — including four-fifths of state attorneys general — say they have a conflict of interest under the arrangement, and that they abuse it.

Last October, the FTC sued the conglomerates, saying they used their dominance in multiple parts of the marketplace to illegally jack up the price of insulin — a drug millions of diabetics need to survive.

The lawsuit comes after the agency in 2022 undertook a major investigation of the health conglomerates. In January, it released an interim report accusing the PBMs of using their dominance to instigate wild price hikes and possibly steer business to affiliated pharmacies.

Politico recently reported that Jordan said his move to consolidate the FTC into the Justice Department was meant to “address the cost of over-regulation.”

“Part of our jurisdiction in Judiciary deals with regulatory concerns and so we are looking at … spending and costs associated with certain regulations. That’s why that language is written the way it was,” Politico reported him as saying.

Many businesses facing regulation — and their advocates in government — have long focused only on the costs. But government regulation can also protect health, safety, the environment, economic stability and competition. Some researchers have said regulation can always be smarter, but its benefits far outweigh the costs.

In a social media post last week, Bedoya, the FTC commissioner, said Jordan’s proposed changes to the agency served another agenda.

“This will gut the FTC,” Bedoya wrote. “FTC is trying to finish a study that already showed how pharmacy middlemen mark up cancer drugs by up to 4,000%. It’s also suing them for allegedly competing to raise insulin prices. If this passes I have no idea what’ll happen to that study and lawsuit.”

Bedoya added, “Take the lawsuit. The draft bill purports to transfer FTC lawyers and lawsuits to DOJ — but it doesn’t transfer the laws that FTC enforces, or authority to enforce those laws. Look (at) page 98 — employees, assets, funding — but no authorities.”

Bedoya also said that when it created the FTC, Congress meant to augment the government’s antitrust powers. Jordan’s changes would remove the government’s ability to police “unfair methods of competition,” Bedoya said, implying that Jordan was trying to slash the government’s power to police wealthy corporations in an era when the political influence of the mega-rich is exploding and the wealth gap is yawning.

“The purpose behind the FTC’s creation in 1914 was to supplement the existing enforcement mechanism (and enforcement gap created by) the Department of Justice,” Bedoya said on X. “When FTC was created in 1914, it alone was authorized to stop something called ‘unfair methods of competition.’ DOJ did not get this” under Jordan’s proposal.

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an raw 5 23 thom h

no lnx

you’ve probably never heard of Anthony Comstock, a Civil War Union soldier and New York Postmaster, who died in 1915. You need to learn about him and his legacy, however, as his long fingers are about to reach up out of the grave and wrap themselves around the necks of every American woman of childbearing years.

Anthony Comstock was a mama’s boy who hated sex. His mother died when he was 10 years old and the shock apparently never left him; women who didn’t live up to her ideal were his open and declared enemies, as were pornography, masturbation, and abortion. He was so ignorant of sex and reproduction that he believed a visible human-like fetus developed “within seconds” of sexual intercourse.

Comstock spent decades scouring the country collecting pornography, which he enthusiastically shared with men in Congress, and harassing “loose women.” For example, when he visited a belly-dancing show (then a new craze) in Chicago at the Cairo Theatre during the World’s Fair of 1893, he demanded the show be shut down.

As Amy Sohn, who wrote a brilliant Comstock biography titled The Man Who Hated Women, noted:

“Despite national controversy and Comstock’s intervention, ultimately the only alteration made to the fair’s belly dancing was costuming: the dancers swapped their gauze blouses for thin woolen undershirts. The vice hunter had lost in Chicago. But he would not forget the dancers, and would have four of them arrested and fined when they came to New York that winter. New York, after all, was Comstockland.”

Comstock lobbied for and shepherded through Congress a law passed on March 3, 1873 titled “An Act for the Suppression of Trade in, and Circulation of, obscene Literature and Articles of immoral Use.” Today we refer to it as the Comstock Act.

Its language with regard to abortion is not at all ambiguous:

“Every obscene, lewd, lascivious, indecent, filthy or vile article, matter, thing, device, or substance … designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral use; and

“Every article, instrument, substance, drug, medicine, or thing which is advertised or described in a manner calculated to lead another to use or apply it for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral purpose; and

“Every written or printed card, letter, circular, book, pamphlet, advertisement, or notice of any kind giving information, directly or indirectly, where, or how, or from whom, or by what means any of such mentioned matters, articles, or things may be obtained or made, or where or by whom any act or operation of any kind for the procuring or producing of abortion will be done or performed, or how or by what means abortion may be produced, whether sealed or unsealed; and

“Every paper, writing, advertisement, or representation that any article, instrument, substance, drug, medicine, or thing may, or can, be used or applied for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral purpose; and

“Every description calculated to induce or incite a person to so use or apply any such article, instrument, substance, drug, medicine, or thing—

“Is declared to be nonmailable matter and shall not be conveyed in the mails or delivered from any post office or by any letter carrier.” (emphasis mine)

The penalty is also not ambiguous. Persons mailing information about abortion, or drugs or devices to produce an abortion:

“[S]hall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both, for the first such offense, and shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both, for each such offense thereafter.”

The Biden administration argues that the Comstock Act of 1873 was set aside almost a century ago.

And, indeed, in 1930, the Appeals Court for the Second Circuit ruled in Youngs Rubber Corp. v. C.I. Lee & Co that the law couldn’t apply to things sent through the mail that are legal, even if they were illegal at the time of the passage of the Comstock Act. (The case involved condoms manufactured by Youngs Rubber.)

“Such a construction,” the court wrote, “would prevent mailing to or by a physician of any drug or mechanical device ‘adapted’ for contraceptive or abortifacient uses, although the physician desired to use or to prescribe it for proper medical purposes.”

The law has been amended by Congress four times (in 1955, 1958, 1971, and 1994), but the language above was never struck because legislators figured the appeals court’s ruling rendered it nugatory.

But don’t tell that to Trump’s appointee Texas District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of Amarillo, who ruled last month that Mifepristone was to be banned nationwide: he based a large part of his decision on the plain language of the Comstock Act.

And don’t tell it to the three rightwing judges hearing an appeal this week of Kacsmaryk’s decision before the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.

When the Biden administration’s attorney argued that Kacsmaryk’s decision was “unprecedented,”Circuit Judge James Ho — also a Trump appointee, who personally swore his good friend Kacsmaryk into his office — interrupted her with a curt snap, saying:

“I guess I’m just wondering why not just focus on the facts of this case rather than have this sort of ‘FDA can do no wrong’ theme.”

The appeals court, made up of a George W. Bush appointee and two Trump appointees, earlier had ruled in their preliminary finding to hear the case that they disagreed with the Biden administration’s assertion that, to quote the three judges, “the [Comstock] law does not mean what it says it means.”

When the Biden interpretation of the Comstock Act was brought up in oral arguments, the Bush appointee, Judge Jennifer Walker Elrod, said there is “some disagreement” about whether previous court rulings actually invalidated the law.

Republican members of Congress agree, and want the Comstock Act enforced nationwide.

In a letter sent to CVS(among other pharmacy chains), Mississippi Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith and eight other Republican senators (Lankford, Daines, Braun, Rubio, Marshall, Risch, Crapo and Blackburn) wrote that the Biden interpretation (and that of Congress in 1955, 1958, 1971, and 1994) is wrong.

“We write to express our support and agreement with 21 State Attorneys General,” they wrote “who have reminded you that Federal law in 18 U.S.C. 1461-1462 [the Comstock Act] criminalizes nationwide using the mail, or interstate shipment by any express company or common carrier, to send or receive any drug that is ‘designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion.’”

The 1930 court ruling that lawmakers and judges had, for over 90 years, believed only applied the Comstock Act to items that were illegal (like child porn), she wrote:

“[D]oes not protect CVS or any other individual or entity from being prosecuted within the five-year statute of limitations for the illegal mailing or interstate shipment of abortion drugs … even for conduct that occurs today.”

The lawyer for Republicans defending Kacsmaryk’s ruling before the Fifth Circuit, Erin Hawley (the wife of Missouri Republican Senator Josh Hawley), went so far as to assert before the court that even physicians and pharmacies shouldn’t be able to receive Mifipristone or other drugs that could produce an abortion via the mail, FedEx, or UPS:

“What the Comstock law says is that it is improper to mail things that induce or cause abortions, which is precisely the action the FDA took in 2021 when it permitted the mailing of abortion drugs.”

If Hawley’s interpretation is ultimately adopted by the Supreme Court, all abortions in the United States would be ended when drugs and suction and surgical devices designed specifically for the procedure can no longer be shipped to hospitals, clinics, or physicians’ offices.

And this is no idle threat.

Given how all three judges on the Fifth Circuit reacted to this week’s arguments, most court observers believe they’ll vote to sustain Judge Kacsmaryk’s ruling and ban Mifipristone nationwide, perhaps even outlawing its legal shipment to pharmacies for other uses like helping with incomplete miscarriages.

Other drugs and surgical devices used for abortions are almost certainly next.

As Washington Post reporter Dan Diamond wrote for his Substack newsletter, anti-abortion activist Mark Lee Dickson, who’s helped several cities around the country put into law local versions of the Comstock Act, told him:

“If a future president were to enforce these federal statutes, then they could shut down every abortion facility in America.”

Such a ruling by the Fifth Circuit will kick the whole mess up to the Supreme Court, where six hardcore rightwing Catholics (Gorsuch attends his wife’s church but was raised Catholic) are gleefully rubbing their hands in anticipation.

This battle promises to be long and hard-fought, and if the Supreme Court rules in favor of the Fifth Circuit’s anticipated decision the only solution will be for Congress to overturn the Comstock Act itself.

And that’s unlikely to happen unless or until Democrats can take back the House, hold the White House, and gain a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate in the 2024 election. The stakes couldn’t be higher.

Several states are now stockpiling Mifipristone in anticipation of just such a dystopian outcome. Families with women and girls of childbearing age may want to do the same.

Forewarned is forearmed.

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

President Joe Biden should 'forcefully resist' TX judge’s 'medically unsound' abortion pill ruling: columnist ›

Texas judge overseeing abortion pill case filed by Josh Hawley's wife donated to his Senate campaign: report ›

The abortion pill, abortion bans and Republican policies that kill ›

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If mifepristone gets banned, medical abortion works with misoprostol ... ›

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Beyond the 'abortion pill': Real stories about mifepristone : Shots ... ›

https://www.alternet.org/2021/05/capitol-riot-2653051980/

Corporations have sent $2.6 million to ‘Sedition Caucus’ Republicans who promoted the January 6 sinsurrection': report

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A common talking point among far-right Trumpistas — from Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri to Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida — is that Corporate America, especially big tech, has it in for Republicans and is using "cancel culture" in an effort to bully them into silence. Hawley, in his fundraising e-mails, has claimed that "woke" corporations are "canceling" him for promoting election security. But according to a new report by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, corporate dollars have been flowing, in a big way, to Republican "insurrectionists" in Congress who voted against certifying President Joe Biden's Electoral College victory over former President Donald Trump in the 2020 election.

CREW members Robert Maguire and Caitlin Moniz, in an article published by its website this week, explain, "In just the first few months since the (January 6) insurrection, corporate and industry PACs have contributed more than $2.6 million to campaigns, leadership PACs, and party committees allied with the 147 members of Congress who fed the Big Lie that led to the deadly attack on the Capitol. In all, 170 business PACs — some of which had previously committed to stop giving — have donated to political committees that support and defend the members who voted not to certify the election results."

The many Senate and House Republicans who voted against Biden's Electoral College certification have been slammed as "the Sedition Caucus" by Democrats as well as by some Never Trump conservatives. And Corporate America, according to CREW, has been generous with Republicans who promoted the Big Lie.

"So far, at least 103 of the 147 members of the so-called Sedition Caucus, along with the two main GOP congressional party committees, the (National Republican Senatorial Committee) and (National Republican Congressional Committee), have benefited from corporate giving after January 6," Maguire and Moniz note. "The ten members with the most corporate donations as of the end of March, which is the latest date for which data is available, have nettedmore than $22,000 each from an average of ten business PACs per member."

Maguire and Moniz cite Rep. Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania as a member of the GOP "Sedition Caucus" who received "$44,000 from 17 corporations and industry groups." Another Republican they mention is Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer of Missouri.

"The NRCC and NRSC — the two main party committees backing Republicans in the House and Senate — have brought in a combined $1.7 million from PACs tied to more than 57 companies and industry groups," Maguire and Moniz note. "The list includes household names likePfizer, Intel, T-Mobile, and CVS, as well as PACs tied to trade groups that represent industries as varied as real estate, mortgage banking, and insurance agents."

Another company mentioned in CREW's report is Cigna.

According to Maguire and Moniz, "The health insurer Cigna…. released a statement after the insurrection saying that it would "discontinue support of any elected official who encouraged or supported violence, or otherwise hindered a peaceful transition of power." But within a month, its PAC was back to making contributions, starting with a $15,000 contribution to the NRSC — soon followed by another $15,000 to the NRCC."

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB

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https://news.littlesis.org/2019/05/29/these-are-the-millionaire-ceos-whose-corporations-fund-politicians-banning-abortions

Popular Information recently published an important article naming six major corporations that made substantial donations to the political leadership in the states that recently passed extreme abortions bans: Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio.

The six corporations are: AT&T, Coca-Cola, Aetna, Walmart, Pfizer, and Eli Lilly.

 2018, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson made over$29 million in his role. Coca Cola CEO James Quincey received$16.7 million between base compensation and bonuses. Aetna is now owned by CVS Health Corporation. CVS CEO Larry J. Merlo made $22 million in 2018.

CEO of Walmart, Doug McMillon made nearly$24 million in base and incentive pay in 2018. Ian Read made$19.5 million as the head of Pfizer. Read left his role in January, but incoming CEO Albert Bourla will likely be on the same pay scale. Eli Lilly is headed by David Ricks. Ricks took in$17.2 million in base, stock, and incentive pay in 2018.

In an indication that corporations may be starting to feel public pressure to distance themselves from doing business with states that have passed anti-abortion legislation, Netflix announced that it is considering pulling out of Georgia, where it films some of its hit shows. But as Judd Legum from Popular Information notes, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has given big to state legislators who have pushed abortion bans.

Whether it’s Netflix or the six companies discussed above, it is critical to know who leads the corporations whose donations keep anti-abortion politicians in office where they can push their reactionary agendas.

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CVS Caremark (formerly CVS) is the largest drugstore chain in the U.S. in terms of number of stores and prescription sales, but second to Walgreen in terms of total store sales. The first CVS store was founded in 1963, and it now operates 6,200 stores in 40 states with corporate headquarters in Woonsocket, RI.[1] Today, CVS fills over one billion prescriptions a year and gets most of its revenue from this. CVS recently purchased prescription benefits management company Caremark Rx for $26.5 billion. In 2005, CVS took over 1,200 Eckerd drugstores mainly in the Sunbelt markets of Florida and Texas. In 2007, CVS finished taking over 700 Sav-on and Osco drugstores mainly in southern California, all getting the CVS name. ^[2]^ ^[3]^

In 2011, CVS reported $107,100,000,000 in net revenue and $20,561,000,000 in gross profit. ^[4]^

Ties to Pete Peterson's "Fix the Debt"

The Campaign to Fix the Debt is the latest incarnation of a decades-long effort by former Nixon man turned Wall Street billionaire Pete Peterson to slash earned benefit programs such as Social Security and Medicare under the guise of fixing the nation's "debt problem." CVS Caremark is part of the Campaign to Fix the Debt as of February 2013.

This article is part of the Center for Media and Democracy's investigation of Pete Peterson's Campaign to "Fix the Debt." Please visit our main SourceWatch page on Fix the Debt.

About Fix the Debt
The Campaign to Fix the Debt is the latest incarnation of a decades-long effort by former Nixon man turned Wall Street billionaire Pete Peterson to slash earned benefit programs such as Social Security and Medicare under the guise of fixing the nation's "debt problem." Through a special report and new interactive wiki resource, the Center for Media and Democracy -- in partnership with the Nation magazine -- exposes the funding, the leaders, the partner groups, and the phony state "chapters" of this astroturf supergroup. Learn more at PetersonPyramid.org and in the *Nation* magazine.

Ties to the American Legislative Exchange Council

Until 2012, CVS Caremark was a corporate member of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). It was a member of ALEC's Health and Human Services Task Force.[5]

CVS Caremark told ColorOfChange.org in July 2012 that it had discontinued its ALEC membership.[6] Please see Corporations Which Have Cut Ties to ALEC for more.

Please see ALEC Corporations for a list of other ALEC corporations.

About ALEC
ALEC is a corporate bill mill. It is not just a lobby or a front group; it is much more powerful than that. Through ALEC, corporations hand state legislators their wishlists to benefit their bottom line. Corporations fund almost all of ALEC's operations. They pay for a seat on ALEC task forces where corporate lobbyists and special interest reps vote with elected officials to approve “model” bills. Learn more at the Center for Media and Democracy'sALECexposed.org, and check out breaking news on our PRWatch.org site.

Leadership

As of February 2013[7]

Executive Officers

Directors

Political contributions

CVS Caremark is prohibited by federal law from making contributions to candidates or political parties in federal elections. Like many companies, CVS Caremark allows eligible employees an opportunity to participate in the political process by contributing to a company-sponsored Political Action Committee.[8] CVS Caremark gave $450,700 to federal candidates in the 2006 election through two political action committees - 42% to Democrats and 57% toRepublicans. ^[9]^ ^[10]^ In 2010, CVS Caremark gave $198,939 total in election cycles through political action committees.[11]

Lobbying

In 2006, CVS Caremark total lobbying expenses were $985,189. CVS used two lobbying firms: Blackwell, Sanders et al and Capitol Alliance. Caremark used three lobbying firms: Alston & Bird, Bockorny Group, and Ernst & Young. ^[12][13]^ The recorded lobbying expenditures totaled $10,015,000 in 2012. Since 2005, annual lobbying CVS Caremark has increased each year. In only 5 years, the total amount has increased about 10 times what it was in 2007.[14]

Contact details

One CVS Dr.

Woonsocket, RI 02895

Phone: 401-765-1500

Fax: 401-762-9227

Web: http://info.cvscaremark.com/

BO praise drop tobacco

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