Details of secret PhRMA deal reveal Obama's hypocrisy

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Washington Examiner:

As a presidential candidate in 2008, then-Sen. Barack Obama ran a campaign ad titled "Billy" in which he blasted the influence that drug companies had in writing the 2003 Medicare prescription drug program for senior citizens. Specifically, the ad highlighted Billy Tauzin, R-La., a former top Republican House member who had fought to prevent the government from negotiating lower drug prices, then retired from Congress and took a job as the pharmaceutical industry's top lobbyist. "I don't want to learn how to play the game better," Obama vowed. "I want to put an end to the game-playing."

On Thursday, the House Energy and Commerce Committee released details from a yearlong investigation into the secret negotiations between the Obama administration and the drug industry during the 2009 push for a national health care reform law. The committee sifted through thousands of emails that paint a picture of insider deal-making that stands in stark contrast to Obama's campaign vows.

Between May and August 2009, as the White House officials and key players in Congress were formulating the national health care law, the Obama administration held ongoing negotiations with PhRMA, the drugmakers' trade group, to secure industry support for the health care law. The secret nature of the meetings, by itself, was a violation of Obama's pledge to broadcast all health care negotiations on C-SPAN. But they're also evidence of the enormous influence of special interests on his administration.

One of PhRMA's top goals was to prevent the new health care law from legalizing the reimportation of prescription drugs. It got its wish after making a secret deal with the White House, the progress of which is detailed in the newly released documents. Nancy DeParle, then-director of the White House Office of Health Reform, wrote to PhRMA's chief lobbyist on June 3, 2009: "Yes -- I pushed this to everyone (Messina, Rahm) is in Egypt with POTUS but Phil Schrillo, Dana Singlser and I made [the] decision, based on how constructive you guys have been, to oppose importation on this bill."

At the time, Rahm Emanuel was White House chief of staff, Jim Messina was deputy chief of staff, Phil Schrillo was Obama's legislative affairs director and Dana Singlser was his special assistant to the president for legislative affairs.

As part of the final deal, PhRMA agreed to support health care legislation, spend millions on ads promoting it, and concede $80 billion in savings and taxes to help finance the bill. In exchange, PhRMA not only ended up with a law that promised to provide it with millions of new customers, but protected it against policies contemplated by Democrats that would have been harmful to their profits. In addition to preventing drug reimportation, the White House also blocked the government from negotiating lower drug prices in the Medicare prescription drug program -- precisely what Obama had faulted Tauzin for doing from his perch in Congress.