On Tuesday, Democratic Rep. Katie Porter took out her famous whiteboard and gave the internet a breath of fresh air. Porter, as well as colleagues in the House Oversight Committee, grilled Richard Gonzalez, the CEO of AbbVie, a pharmaceutical company, over the increasing price of Humira—an anti-inflammatory drug used to treat conditions like Crohn’s—in the U.S. while apparently reducing the cost of the drug in other countries. While the company has argued the price increases came down to innovations in the drug, Porter and fellow Democrats on the committee were far from convinced.
"You lie to patients when you charge them twice as much for an unimproved drug,” Porter stated in the two-minute video that’s quickly going viral. “And then you lie to policymakers when you tell us that R&D justifies those price increases.” Zing! Let’s check out the full video, and Porter’s history of grilling executives with her whiteboard in hand, below.
During the hearing, Porter asked Gonzalez how much money AbbVie spent on dividends and stock buybacks. Gonzalez didn’t have a specific number available to offer, so Porter supplied her own, saying that the company spent $50 billion between 2013 and 2018 on stocks to help shareholders. In comparison, the company contributed a far smaller amount to research and development. Mind you, research and development is the part of the company that actually improves drugs.
Porter described "the Big Pharma fairy tale” as focused on innovative research and development that theoretically justifies the high prices of these medicines, but, as she put it, “the pharma reality is that you spend most of your company's money making money for yourself and your shareholders."
"You're not honest about that with patients and policymakers,” Porter continued. “You're feeding us lies that we must pay astronomical prices to get 'innovative' treatments. The American people, the patients, deserve so much better."
Porter also asked Gonzalez to share how much the company paid its executives. Gonzalez said executives were compensated with about $60 million per year—a truly staggering number. The number Porter offered was even more staggering, bordering on the surreal: a cool $334 million.
Here is that video.
We’ve seen Porter absolutely skewer an oil executive who tried to explain tax law to her. We’ve seen her whiteboard previously, too, when she reminded a big pharma executive just how much of his massive salary—to the tune of $13 million—came from outrageously expensive cancer treatment drugs. Back in March, we also saw Porter push Chief of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Dr. Robert Redfield to promise that all testing for the novel coronavirus would be free regardless of insurance coverage. She’s annihilated former Trump Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin during a hearing about taxpayer funds amid the pandemic. She’s also taken to Twitter to call out Republicans like Mitch McConnell when time was of the essence.
In short, Porter taking a stand is nothing new, but it continues to be inspiring, and it’s a level of dedication to the American public that her peers on both sides of the aisle should aspire to.
Here’s a clip of that video on YouTube.
YouTube Video
"You lie to patients when you charge them twice as much for an unimproved drug,” Porter stated in the two-minute video that’s quickly going viral. “And then you lie to policymakers when you tell us that R&D justifies those price increases.” Zing! Let’s check out the full video, and Porter’s history of grilling executives with her whiteboard in hand, below.
During the hearing, Porter asked Gonzalez how much money AbbVie spent on dividends and stock buybacks. Gonzalez didn’t have a specific number available to offer, so Porter supplied her own, saying that the company spent $50 billion between 2013 and 2018 on stocks to help shareholders. In comparison, the company contributed a far smaller amount to research and development. Mind you, research and development is the part of the company that actually improves drugs.
Porter described "the Big Pharma fairy tale” as focused on innovative research and development that theoretically justifies the high prices of these medicines, but, as she put it, “the pharma reality is that you spend most of your company's money making money for yourself and your shareholders."
"You're not honest about that with patients and policymakers,” Porter continued. “You're feeding us lies that we must pay astronomical prices to get 'innovative' treatments. The American people, the patients, deserve so much better."
Porter also asked Gonzalez to share how much the company paid its executives. Gonzalez said executives were compensated with about $60 million per year—a truly staggering number. The number Porter offered was even more staggering, bordering on the surreal: a cool $334 million.
Here is that video.
Big Pharma says they need to charge astronomical prices to pay for research and development. Yet, the amount they spend on manipulating the market to enrich shareholders completely eclipses what's spent on R&D. Today, I confronted a CEO about the industry's lies, with visualspic.twitter.com/c3jSLr0yVd
— Rep. Katie Porter (@RepKatiePorter) May 18, 2021
We’ve seen Porter absolutely skewer an oil executive who tried to explain tax law to her. We’ve seen her whiteboard previously, too, when she reminded a big pharma executive just how much of his massive salary—to the tune of $13 million—came from outrageously expensive cancer treatment drugs. Back in March, we also saw Porter push Chief of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Dr. Robert Redfield to promise that all testing for the novel coronavirus would be free regardless of insurance coverage. She’s annihilated former Trump Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin during a hearing about taxpayer funds amid the pandemic. She’s also taken to Twitter to call out Republicans like Mitch McConnell when time was of the essence.
In short, Porter taking a stand is nothing new, but it continues to be inspiring, and it’s a level of dedication to the American public that her peers on both sides of the aisle should aspire to.
Here’s a clip of that video on YouTube.
YouTube Video