Senator Bernie Sanders has issued a statement in response to President Trump’s recent executive order on prescription drug pricing. The order aims to reduce drug costs by aligning U.S. prices with those in other countries where they are significantly lower.
Sanders, who serves as the Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), expressed agreement with Trump on the issue of high drug prices in the United States. “I agree with President Trump: It is an outrage that the American people pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs,” Sanders stated. He highlighted that Americans sometimes pay ten times more for identical medications compared to residents of other major nations.
However, Sanders criticized the pharmaceutical industry for its substantial profits and questioned the effectiveness of Trump’s executive order. “The problem is not that the price of prescription drugs is too low in Europe and Canada. The problem is that the extraordinarily greedy pharmaceutical industry made over $100 billion in profits last year by ripping off the American people,” he asserted.
Sanders also predicted legal challenges to Trump’s order and called for legislative action instead. “Further, as Trump well knows, his executive order will be thrown out by the courts,” he said. Sanders announced plans to introduce legislation aimed at ensuring Americans do not pay more for prescription drugs than people in other major countries. He urged bipartisan cooperation to pass this legislation swiftly.
