Trump EO to lower drug prices: Where did that come from?
(The massively staffed) Department of Diversions? Department of External Revenue? Department of Tiny Taxes on the Rich? Department of Magical Budget Thinking...a ha!
Thank heaven for all the DOGE cuts—even if they were likely less than 5% of his projections. Otherwise, we couldn’t have staffed all the new departments in the White House.
Why this matters to women: Is there anyone else more acutely aware of drug prices for the extended family? Doubtful.
When Trump signed1 yesterday’s EO sorta-mandate on lowering drug prices in 30 days, my first thought was it came from the Department of Diversions, leading me to wonder what exactly we needed to be diverted from now, always a concern.
While it’s true that the U.S. pays the most for prescription medicines in the world, often nearly three times that of other developed nations, let’s just say reducing drug prices hasn’t been a Republican priority. More: Here’s the WH Fact-lite Sheet and reads from Axios, MSNBC, Fox, and also a list of the 10 most expensive drugs in America from Fox.2
“Sorta-mandate” because the markets and drug companies took a quick look at it, initially concerned, then decided “meh.” As Reuters reported, “The order was not as bad as feared, investors, analysts and drug pricing experts said, and they questioned how it would be implemented [or how non-compliance would be punished]. Shares of drugmakers, which had been down on the threat of "most favored nation" pricing, recovered and rose on Monday.”
Besides, “Importing foreign prices from socialist countries would be a bad deal for American patients and workers,” according to Stephen Ubl, CEO of industry trade group PhRMA. (Whew! almost got excited about another socialism horror; grave error prevented.)
But today, the real WH department originating this one was identified as the Department of Magical Budget Thinking, which shares staff with the Department of External Revenue (AKA Department of Tariffs), which explains the 30-day timeframe, since that Big Beautiful Bill is supposed to make it through both the House and Senate ASAP.
“I said when you score3, you’re going to have to score two things, you’re going to have to number one score the hundreds of billions of dollars of tariff money that’s coming in. But even bigger than that, you’re going to have to score that your cost for Medicaid and Medicare and just basically pharmaceuticals and drugs are going down at a level that nobody has ever seen before,” Trump declared.
Let the games begin. Don’t miss the hearings this afternoon, particularly if you like drama, rending of garments, and media posturing. Watch on the National Medical Association website or on C-Span; check the Senate website for more options.
Has there ever been a signature that told you so much about the man?
And here you thought I didn’t even know Fox existed, let alone link to them.
Here our fearless leader is referring to the CBO scoring of budget bills—which made me wonder why DOGE didn’t handle the CBO a long time ago. Here’s more on the CBO, the ‘independent, non-partisan director of which is “appointed by the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President pro tempore of the Senate jointly appoint CBO's Director, after considering recommendations from the two Budget Committees. Directors are appointed for four-year terms and may be reappointed to the position.”
The current CBO director, Phillip Swagel, began serving on June 3, 2019. He was reappointed to a second term on July 27, 2023. So…each party represented in the choice both times.
Untouchable by the White House, and so far tolerated by Congress.
If nothing else, Trump has certainly inspired civics research.