House Democrats call on major pharmacy chains to dispense mifepristone

 House Democrats are calling on five major pharmacy chains to commit to dispensing mifepristone in states where it remains legal, following the recent Supreme Court decision that preserved the current accessibility of the drug. 

In letters sent to Walmart, Safeway, Kroger, Costco and Health Mart, a group of more than 50 House Democrats — led by Reps. Judy Chu (Calif.) and Dan Goldman (N.Y.) — pressed the pharmacies to become certified dispensers of mifepristone.   

“We are disappointed that you have not publicly pursued certification for the past year,” the Democrats wrote. “We strongly urge you to consider policies that facilitate access to essential and time-sensitive reproductive health care services, including medication abortion, which are clear to your consumers and to your pharmacy employees.” 

In 2023, the Food and Drug Administration established a process for retail pharmacies to become certified to dispense mifepristone to patients with valid prescriptions, the first in the two-drug process used in medication abortions.  

Goldman and Chu said they reached out to the same five pharmacies in June 2023 about offering mifepristone, but the companies did not say whether they planned to get certified. 

In the wake of last month’s Supreme Court decision that preserved current access to mifepristone, the Democrats urged the pharmacies to reconsider.  

“This lack of action to certify is misaligned with your publicly stated values in support of equal access to health care and in support of gender equality,” they wrote. “In light of escalating attacks on bodily autonomy and on people’s freedom to make their own health care decisions, we believe that your companies have a social responsibility to consumers and communities to address this issue as soon as possible.” 

The lawmakers are seeking responses from the pharmacies by July 12. 

Walgreens and CVS are the only two major retail pharmacies that have publicly sought the certification, and the companies began selling mifepristone in March in states where it remains legal to do so.  

Walgreens in particular took heat from both sides of the abortion argument spectrum. The company angered Democrats and abortion rights advocates when it declined to dispense abortion pills in 21 states, including four states where abortion was still legal. 

The company also faced an onslaught of attacks and threats from Republican attorneys general as well as anti-abortion groups for selling mifepristone in the first place.  

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/4752756-house-democrats-urge-pharmacies-dispense-mifepristone/

White House: Hunter Biden helped with Biden speech prep Monday

 The White House said that President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, was in a meeting with advisers on Monday to prepare for a speech later that day.

“He came back with his dad from Camp David, walked him into the speech prep and he was in the room. I can tell you he was in the room,” press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said when asked about reporting that Hunter Biden was advising his father.

NBC reported that Hunter Biden has joined meetings with the president and top aides since the debate Thursday. The president’s poor performance in the debate has led to shock and panic among Democrats, with some operatives, former aides and a House Democrat calling on him to step aside.

Jean-Pierre on Tuesday said Hunter Biden returned to the White House from Camp David with Biden on Monday afternoon, and the meeting happened quickly upon return. The meeting was to prepare Biden for a speech later that evening about the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision.

She argued that it’s the week of Fourth of July, so there are going to be family members around Biden this week, noting the president is “very close to his family.”

The Biden family was together at Camp David over the weekend, during which first lady Jill Biden called Vogue to insist that her husband isn’t dropping out of the 2024 race.

The Bidens are a very close-knit family, and major decisions, like those involving the president’s political future, are largely considered to be made among the first lady and his family.

A jury delivered a guilty verdict for Hunter Biden last month on three charges related to the purchase of a gun in 2018. Since then, the president has ruled out the possibility of communing the sentence.

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/4752458-hunter-biden-advises-president-biden/

PBMs lobby up

 The ​Pharmaceutical Care Management Association (PCMA), the trade association representing pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), hired Emergent Strategies to lobby on issues related to the industry. PBMs have been under tremendous pressure from lawmakers, pharmaceutical groups and others who argue they drive up prescription drug prices and demand transparency into their opaque operations. 

The PCMA has been at the forefront of pushing back on those claims and engaging with lawmakers on a slate of bills that could reform the industry. Its federal lobbying spending skyrocketed to $15.4 million last year from $8.7 million in 2022, according to the nonpartisan political money tracking organization OpenSecrets.

Scott Eckhart, the former lead Democratic lobbyist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, will work on the account.

https://thehill.com/lobbying/4749654-bottom-line-pbms-plus-up/

Moderate House Dem: ‘Donald Trump is going to win, and I’m OK with that’

 Rep. Jared Golden (Maine), a moderate Democrat, published an op-ed Tuesday arguing former President Trump is going to win the election and he’s “OK with that.”

Golden, who has held his seat in the House since 2019, wrote a piece published in the Bangor Daily News, headlined, “Donald Trump is going to win the election and democracy will be just fine,” in response to the outcry of concern from his party following President Biden’s lackluster debate performance.

The Maine congressman argued that Biden’s on-stage presence didn’t rattle him like it did others because the outcome of the 2024 presidential election has been clear to him for months.

“While I don’t plan to vote for him, Donald Trump is going to win. And I’m OK with that,” Golden wrote.

The House Democrat argued that others in his party are concerned that if Trump wins the election this fall, it will be a threat to democracy. The proclamations from Golden’s party were only exacerbated after the Supreme Court on Monday granted broad immunity to Trump in his Jan. 6 case.

Golden said he rejects the idea that Trump will overturn American democracy. He said sounding the alarm about a Trump victory ignores the strength of a nearly 250-year-old nation.

“Unlike Biden and many others, I refuse to participate in a campaign to scare voters with the idea that Trump will end our democratic system,” he said.

Golden, who served combat tours as a Marine in Iraq and Afghanistan, noted that Jan. 6, 2021, was a “dark day.” Still, he said, police officers, judges, state election officials, members of Congress joined to defend democracy like members of the U.S. military.

“This election is about the economy, not democracy. And when it comes to our economy, our Congress matters far more than who occupies the White House,” Golden wrote.

By January, Golden believes Trump will once again occupy the White House and Maine’s lawmakers must be willing to not only hold him accountable, but to work with him.

“I urge everyone — voters, elected officials, the media, and all citizens — to ignore the chattering class’s scare tactics and political pipedreams,” Golden wrote. “We don’t need party insiders in smoke-filled back rooms to save us. We can defend our democracy without them.”

Golden, like all other House lawmakers, is up for reelection this year. He will take on Maine state Rep. Austin Theriault, a Republican, in the general election this fall.

Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan index, ranks Golden’s district as a toss-up. Trump carried the district by 6 points in 2020.

His op-ed is a stark contrast to comments from Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), who on Tuesday became the first House Democrat to publicly call on Biden to remove himself from the race.

In a post on social media platform X, Theriault said Golden’s piece was “a very phony attempt to avoid accountability.” He asked Golden if he supports Biden or not and whether he believes the president is mentally competent.

“He won’t say, because he puts politics ahead of Mainers,” Theriault said.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4752547-house-dem-trump-is-going-to-win-and-im-ok-with-that/

'Biden campaign attacks media while playing defense on debate'

 President Biden’s reelection campaign is attacking the media, saying it is overplaying coverage of Biden’s bad debate performance while not covering positive news for the president.

On a Zoom call with donors Monday evening, Biden’s deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks derided the press directly, saying “the media has spent a ton of time blowing this out of proportion. We are not going to be in a defensive posture on this campaign.”  

The campaign also has gone on the attack in fundraising messages to supporters.

“Did you see the awesome clips of our supporters on the tarmac doing the Cupid Shuffle at 2am on the night of the debate?” a Biden fundraising email from over the weekend read. “Well, no, probably not, because the media is busy hyperventilating and trying to manifest drama to boost ratings.”  

Biden’s shaky debate performance has raised questions about his viability as the presumptive Democratic nominee. Concerns about the 81-year-old president’s age were apparent before the debate, but his muddled performance against former President Trump has amplified them.

On Tuesday, Rep. Lloyd Doggett (Texas) became the first sitting House Democrat to call on him to step down.

In trying to deflect the criticism, the administration has turned to a familiar foe: the news media.

Criticism of the media began while the debate was still taking place, as some criticized the lack of fact checking from CNN moderators Jake Tapper and Dana Bash when it came to Trump’s repeated false claims.  

Tapper himself pushed back on the campaign’s blame game this week.  

“There is a pattern of Democratic officials seemingly trying to convince you, the public, to not believe what you saw and what you heard with your eyes and with your ears,” the anchor said Monday on his daily news show, adding it was not “honest” to dismiss the president’s debate performance as a one-off event, as his top aides have.  

Some observers have drawn parallels between team Biden attacking the media in recent days and the long-standing attacks on journalists that have come from his opponent, a strategy that has proven to energize Trump’s base in recent political cycles.  

“The most important part of a political fight is contrast,” said one top Democratic strategist. “The press is not popular, and the press is an obvious opponent in the public relations fight.” 

But others say such a strategy could be risky and would only lead to more problems for the president’s reelection chances.  

“It’s indicative of their weakened position,” said Cayce Myers, a public relations expert who teaches in the school of communications at Virginia Tech. “It’s clearly a deflection mechanism and the media don’t typically respond well to this type of criticism, which in this case is unfounded.”  

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Tuesday the administration was merely looking to “turn the page” on the postdebate fallout and defended how it has responded to postdebate media coverage.  

“We have a right to push back. It’s a give and take,” she said during a briefing with reporters. “This is an exercise of democracy, if there’s some reporting, we don’t believe it to be true, I don’t see anything wrong with [push back] … if we want to share our side of things, we do so.”  

Republican strategist Susan Del Percio, who does not support Trump, said campaigns that are losing often take a hostile approach toward the press.

“It’s what you do when you don’t have anything else,” Del Percio told The Hill.

While many of Trump’s attacks have sought to discredit specific prominent journalists and basic facts about him, the approach taken by those advocating against the press on behalf of Biden has been different.  

“Trump tries to discredit the media in their existence as non-truth tellers,” Del Percio said. “But keeping a story alive based on truth and interviews is not the same thing. The media is the easy target … but the Democrats right now are the ones keeping the story alive.” 

One Democratic strategist said the media isn’t to blame for what happened on Thursday, “but the media amplification has made it worse.” This strategist, however, said the coverage was “not out of bounds or unwarranted.” 

The strategist said that while Biden has generally maintained a good relationship with members of the media during his time in office, he’s always felt “some disrespect” dating back to the previous election cycles when media outlets were writing him off as he struggled to win contests during the Democratic primary.  

“He’s never forgotten that,” the strategist said.   

There are some signs the White House and Biden’s campaign are still willing to play ball with top media outlets despite the frosty relations.

ABC, which is slated to host the second presidential debate this fall, announced on Tuesday that Biden would sit for a one-on-one interview with anchor George Stephanopoulos that will air over the holiday weekend.  

Some observers note it’s a step in the right direction for a campaign that is better served focusing their messaging on issues important to voters rather than grumbling about the tone of the press he is receiving.  

“I don’t think it’ll be super effective if he spends the rest of the campaign, assuming he stays in the campaign, making the press an issue,” said Mark Conrad, a professor of law and ethics at Fordham University. “You would think Donald Trump would be the issue for Joe Biden. You’re not voting for the press; you’re voting for a candidate for president.”  

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4752709-biden-campaign-media-attacks/

'Initial postdebate polls show Biden losing ground to Trump'

 Polling has started to come out following last week’s presidential debate between former President Trump and President Biden, showing some indications of Trump gaining in the aftermath. 

Anticipation for the debate built up in advance for both candidates, but especially for Biden, who was hoping to use the night to overcome worries that he’s not up to the job of president for four more years. Instead, he at times stumbled over his words, struggled to make clear statements on policy positions and did not present significant energy that many Democrats wanted to see. 

Although Trump made numerous false statements throughout the debate — significantly more than Biden — he came off as more competent and cognizant during the night, despite the candidates’ ages being similar. 

Accordingly, polling respondents have mostly said Trump was the winner of the debate, and the former president has seen a subsequent rise in the polls. But it’s still less than a week after the debate, and the change has been more modest than some might expect. 

“I don’t know how anyone looks at the debate performance in some of the after-reaction about who won the debate and says, ‘Hey, this is going to be helpful to the president’s numbers.’ I think the question is, you know, how hurtful will it be?” said Scott Tranter, the director of data science at Decision Desk HQ (DDHQ). 

Biden was already trailing Trump a bit heading into the debate. Although the national polling had been a bit mixed with each candidate slightly ahead at times, the former president has mostly led the incumbent by at least a few points in the roughly half-dozen key battleground states that will likely decide the election. 

The debate presented an opportunity for Biden to give himself a boost and tamp down concerns about his cognitive ability to run for another term and serve as president. But the performance instead has caused worries among Democrats to reach a boiling point that Biden is not capable of defeating Trump as he did four years ago. 

Democrats have a noted tendency to panic when a concerning political development occurs — but the numbers confirm at least some of their fears in the aftermath of the debate.

A USA Today/Suffolk University poll released Tuesday showed Trump with a 3-point lead over Biden in a race that includes third-party and independent candidates, after the two were tied in the previous poll in May. A majority of respondents said Trump won the debate, and nearly a third said the debate made them more likely to vote for Trump, while only 10 percent said it made them more likely to support Biden. 

Polling has also found majorities of Democratic voters wanting the party to move on from Biden in favor of another candidate who they believe would have a better shot at besting Trump. A CNN poll released Tuesday found 75 percent of registered voters said Democrats would have a better chance with a candidate other than Biden, including 56 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents. The same poll also showed Vice President Harris, who has been rumored as a top possible replacement for Biden if he were to step aside, performing better against Trump than Biden. Harris was only down 2 points to Trump, without having run a presidential campaign, while Biden was down 6 points.

Perhaps even more concerning is a poll released yesterday out of a state Republicans are hoping to flip in November.

Trump led Biden by 2 points, 44 percent support to 42 percent, in a Saint Anselm College poll of New Hampshire, a state that has leaned toward Democrats in national elections for years despite often being decided by single-digit margins. 

The result is a major swing from a December survey from the same pollster, where Biden led Trump by 10 points. It is just one poll, and the result is within the margin of error, but if New Hampshire is in play, that would be concerning for Democrats who would rather be able to focus on states more recently considered complete toss-ups. 

“Fundamentally, structurally, it is a Democratic state,” Tranter said. “If we’ve got a poll that shifted … it is still likely that Joe Biden wins the state, but that is not a good trend. If that state is competitive, if Joe Biden only wins that state by 1 or 2 [points], that means other states like Maine, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, because these things are correlated, are probably more competitive as well.” 

At the same time, Biden’s poll numbers have not fallen off a cliff, at least so far. While Trump has gained or maintained his leads in the few polls that have come out, Biden’s support has not collapsed. 

Trump’s lead held steady at 6 points in a Harvard CAPS/Harris poll released Monday, with 47 percent support to Biden’s 41 percent. Each had their share drop by 2 points compared to the last poll from May. 

Trump’s lead over Biden also stayed mostly the same when pollsters asked respondents their preferences while including independents Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Cornel West and Green Party candidate Jill Stein. 

One explanation may be the large percentage of voters who have already made up their minds about whom to support in November with the intense political divisions in the country and Trump and Biden being such well-known figures. 

The Harvard/Harris poll showed 72 percent of respondents said they already decided whom they will vote for, up 3 points from the 69 percent who said so in May. 

“This electorate’s pretty solid,” Tranter said. “President Biden’s got a core base and a core base of people who will never vote for Trump, and same to Donald Trump.” 

But Tranter said that means a smaller shift could still be deeply consequential for the outcome of the race. He said he would consider a 4-point shift, or more, to be “significant movement outside the margins,” adding that’s what the public should look for rather than a 10-point shift. 

Still, DDHQ has not yet observed a shift in the national polling average overall since the debate based on seven polls it takes into account for its average. Trump was ahead by about 1 point both before and after the debate. 

In terms of DDHQ’s calculations of each candidate’s chances to win nationwide and in the key states, only a few relatively small tweaks have been made. Maine and New Hampshire shifted 3 percentage points toward Trump, moving Maine just inside the toss-up territory and New Hampshire leaning Biden but just outside a toss-up.

Most changes, if any, are only a 1-point shift toward Trump, but a small difference could be key this year. Often even more major developments in a political race will only cause a temporary shift in polling, but time will be needed to assess any longer-term impacts of the debate. 

Tranter said likely another five or six national polls will need to be released to give a better sense of the debate’s impacts, which should happen in the next week to 10 days. He said he would also like to see one or two polls of each battleground state, which may be a couple weeks away. 

“Donald Trump has certainly proved you can have a bad news week and come back, and so we’ll see if Joe Biden has the same magic,” he said.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4751899-donald-trump-joe-biden-debate-polls-kamala-harris/

'FDA bans soda additive over health concerns'

 The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has banned a soda additive starting next month over health concerns.

The FDA said Tuesday that it revoked its regulation that allowed brominated vegetable oil (BVO) to be used in food because it “is no longer considered safe.” The agency pointed to studies conducted with the National Institutes of Health that “found the potential for adverse health effects in humans.”

The new rule will go into effect Aug. 2.

BVO is typically added to sodas to stop citrus flavoring from separating and floating to the top of the drink. The FDA initially proposed banning BVO from food last fall, pointing to studies that found the additive is toxic to the thyroid.

The ingredient list may show “brominated vegetable oil” or a more specific oil, such as “brominated soybean oil.” The FDA noted that many beverage makers have reformulated their recipes to replace BVO with a different ingredient, adding that just a “few” beverages in the U.S. still contain the additive.

Jim Jones, the deputy commissioner for the FDA’s Human Foods program, said in a statement that the agency is “committed to conducting reassessments to ensure that our original determinations of safety have held up over time.”

“The removal of the only authorized use of BVO from the food supply was based on a thorough review of current science and research findings that raised safety concerns,” he said.

“We will continue to monitor emerging evidence on the chemicals we have targeted for reassessment, and in cases such as this, where the science no longer supports continued authorized use, we will take action to protect public health,” he added.

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/4752640-fda-ban-soda-additive-bvo/