Big Pharma is a plague on both aisles of "our house".
Dark Money groups, millions in lobbying, and stock ownership run rampant in the US Government.
As reported by Politico, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America gave $2.68 million to Center Forward, a group once known as the Blue Dog Research Forum, chaired by former Rep. Bud Cramer (D-Ala.). According to its website, the group convenes lawmakers, corporations, trade associations, and others “to find common ground.
Trade association Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhARMA) gave $1.439 million to Center Forward in 2018, according to their tax filing.
According to impact, near $3 million were spent on ads praising Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) for their bipartisan leadership. Other representatives propped up included: Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.), Kathleen Rice (D-N.Y.), Lou Correa (D-Calif.), Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.), Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), and Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.)
Pfizer PACs contributed more than $4 million to candidates and committees in the 2020 election cycle, while Johnson & Johnson PACs donated over $2 million.
Both Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson gave more to Democrats than to Republicans.
Of the three major vaccine manufacturers, Pfizer leads with the most handsome lumps of money spent lobbying members of Congress during the pandemic. Pfizer spent nearly $11 million lobbying the federal government in 2020, and above 7 million in 2021. (Source Open Secrets )
But there’s also the awkward issue of at least 75 lawmakers buying and selling stock in companies that make COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics, and tests.
As much as we talk about the CDC and the FDA being sponsored by Big Pharma, our own representatives dipping in this pot of gold is a similar conflict of interest.
Legislators held investments in Pfizer, Moderna, and J&J as Congress was in the midst of pandemic relief steps. In 2020 and 2021, members of Congress voted on six relief bills together worth nearly $6 trillion. Congress also approved above $10 billion to help drug companies generate and distribute vaccines and forced health insurers to cover the cost of getting the shot.
Conflicted Congress Report ranks and reviews lawmakers and staffers for ethical problems with personal finances and public duties.
An example is Rep. Marie Newman, a Democrat of Illinois, along with her husband, Jim Newman, who has traded shares of both Johnson & Johnson and Moderna. The congresswoman's 2020 annual personal financial disclosure listed them as holding Moderna shares together.
But Republican legislators are no stranger to benefiting from the situation:
Mo Brooks of Alabama sold near $50,000 worth of Pfizer stock in August 2021, resulting in a strategic near-month gap filing his disclosure. Brooks, a significantly pro-Trump lawmaker, currently running for a US Senate seat, once accused the pharmaceutical giant of playing politics with the timing of its announcement about vaccine-efficacy data.
Vivien Scott, the wife of Rep. Austin Scott, a Republican of Georgia, traded up to $50,000 worth of Johnson & Johnson stock, and Marjorie Taylor Greene’s financial disclosure shows stock-ownership of Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and AstraZeneca during 2020.
Democrat Rep. John Yarmuth of Kentucky who sits on the House Budget Committee, sold up to $15,000 worth of stock in 3M, responsible for creating and distributing PPE like N95 masks, at the end of March 2020. Another Democratic colleague, Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota, and her husband held up to $250,000 worth of 3M shares, according to her annual disclosure.
Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer and his wife, Margaret Kirkpatrick, bought close to $15,000 worth of stock in Quest Diagnostics, a leading COVID-19 test provider, in March 2020.
Representative Don Beyer of Virginia, also a Democrat, reported buying almost $15,000 worth of Monoclonal Antibodies (Regeneron )stock in May 2020, using a jointly held account. He sold up to $30,000 worth of the stock between July and August 2020 through a jointly held account.
New Jersey Dem. Rep. Tom Malinowski spoke out against Covid profiteering in 2020 but turned out to be doing just that: He sold 15,000 worth of stock in Covid-19 Testing company Chembio Diagnostics.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a freshman Republican of Alabama, has invested in J&J, Regeneron, and 3M. As a member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, which has routinely conducted hearings on COVID-19-related matters, his investments represent a clear conflict of interest.
In the summer of 2020, Republican Rep. Carol Miller of West Virginia reported that her husband, Matt Miller, had bought up to $50,000 worth of shares of Abbott Laboratories, another COVID-19 testing company.
Redefining standards for an eternal cycle of money flow and revolving door deals for our Government officials?
Fauci said on Friday that the regulators were open to reconsidering those definitions.
“There’s no doubt that optimum vaccination is with a booster,” he said.
One has to wonder about the legality of cities Vaccine Mandates, which leave very little wiggle room for its inhabitants, and the money machine of Big Pharma, in connection with the House of (the peoples) Representatives.
Last, we need to mention the unsurprising ego-stroking of Ex-President Donald Trump:
President Trump also appeared on Bill O’Reilly to help Big Pharma push their booster shots, declaring, along with Bill O’Reilly, that he was fully vaccinated and had received his booster shot.
He contended with his supporters to join him in “taking credit” for rolling out the COVID-19 shots in 2020, stating that those who disagree with his position on the COVID-19 shots were “playing right into their hands” by letting the Democrats and the Biden Administration take all the credit for them.
When Trump requested whether his audience agreed with him,( completely ignoring and disregarding what is now tens of thousands of deaths and nearly 1 million adverse events following the COVID-19 shots, which is more deaths and injuries than following all FDA-approved vaccines for the past 31 years), the crowd cheered.
There are a lot of legal and ethical controversies surrounding the Big Pharma products, and furthermore, the mandates currently being implemented to “trap” people into positions where they cannot avoid taking them.
The amount of US Government officials who honor and equate Natural immunity, acquired through prior infection from Covid-19 disease to the Vaccines, is currently very lean.
Some wonder what kind of message conflicted (former and current) legislators are conveying to Vaccine victims such as Maddie de Garay.
The efficacy of the Vaccines is also still on trial. A new study shows negative VE( vaccine effectiveness) against SARS-CoV-2 infection with the Omicron or Delta variants following a two-dose or booster BNT162b2 or mRNA-1273 vaccination series.
My conclusion: A plague on both aisles of our ( not so United) House. But maybe it could serve as a uniting factor, in a world of truth and altruism.
-TamiCam
Excellent work. Thank you so much for all you are doing.
The tainted representatives should be stripped of their office and forced to cede all of their ill-gotten gains - nothing short of blood money - to those who have been injured through these vaccines, or to the families of those who have died.