A Democrat introduced legislation in Congress to codify President Donald Trump’s executive order to reduce drug prices.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) announced his intentions on the House floor on Wednesday, emphasizing the point that Americans shouldn’t be paying more for drugs than people in other countries.
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“I rise today to introduce as legislation, President Trump’s executive order for the most favored nation status on drug pricing,” Khanna said. “My legislation will codify President Trump’s executive order, which basically says that Americans should not pay more for drugs than people in other countries and other parts of the world.”
“Right now, we are paying two to three times more for our drugs than people in other industrialized nations,” the congressman added. “Now, this executive order, codified by the legislation, will allow our Cabinet secretaries to put pressure on Big Pharma and make sure they are not price-gouging, and will allow for the importation of cheaper drugs.”
Trump addressed this discrepancy in his executive order on Monday.
“Americans should not be forced to subsidize low-cost prescription drugs and biologics in other developed countries, and face overcharges for the same products in the United States,” read the order. “Americans must therefore have access to the most-favored-nation price for these products.”
“My Administration will take immediate steps to end global freeloading and, should drug manufacturers fail to offer American consumers the most-favored-nation lowest price, my Administration will take additional aggressive action,” read the order.
Trump’s order specified that all action would be taken to “ensure foreign countries are not engaged in any act, policy, or practice that may be unreasonable or discriminatory”, threaten national security, or force U.S. taxpayers “to pay for a disproportionate amount of global pharmaceutical research and development.”
“To the extent consistent with law, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary) shall facilitate direct-to-consumer purchasing programs for pharmaceutical manufacturers that sell their products to American patients at the most-favored-nation price,” read Trump’s order.
Khanna meanwhile explained why legislation to codify Trump’s order was needed. He highlighted it was due to the nefarious ambitions of Big Pharma.
“Why do we need the legislation?” Khanna asked. “Because the reality is that Big Pharma will sue for the executive order, like they did in the previous Trump administration. And in the previous administration, they managed to kill the executive order. The only way we can stand up to Big Pharma is to codify in legislation what the president wants to do in an executive order.”
Khanna also emphasized that Republicans should be willing to put aside ideological differences and support his legislation, since he is doing that very thing to support the president’s directive.
“If I can cross the aisle and support President Trump’s executive order in legislation, every Republican should be willing to cross the aisle and support my legislation,” Khanna said.
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“Are we going to stand in this body with the $16 billion that Big Pharma spent on lobbying, or are we going to stand with the American people?” Khanna asked. “We will know that answer based on how many co-sponsors we get for my legislation that simply codifies Donald Trump’s executive order.”
Khanna’s bill has not been posted to his webpage yet, and it is not currently known what, if anything, else will be included in the bill that could deter congressional representatives from potentially sponsoring Khanna’s legislation.