In all of the post-mortems about the 2024 election, much will be written about the major issues that flood the airwaves and are featured in many a clickbait article. Less talked about, but perhaps also a factor in Trump’s victory in the state of Michigan is the pushback against Big Pharma and the protection of the 340B program.
When you look at the map of the election results in Michigan, you’ll see a sea of red and a few pockets of blue. Where are these small pockets of blue? As was the case throughout the county, they were around the major cities. The sea of red? The rural parts of the state. Areas that are served by networks like Trinity Health, who is a major provider of the 340B Drug Pricing Program in Michigan.
After Robert F. Kennedy Jr. dropped out of the presidential race and joined forces with the Trump campaign, taking on Big Pharma became a larger part of President-elect Trump’s platform. This message resonated with voters across the country, and in Michigan in particular where representatives have already recently been taking a stand against these pharmaceutical companies and for the 340B program and rural hospitals in the state.
Last month, Michigan Reps. Bergman and Huizenga joined a bipartisan effort to deliver a win for Michiganders against Big Pharma and high drug prices. This comes shortly after Johnson & Johnson (J&J) flagrantly tried flouting a federal law that has has been key in ensuring rural, working-class Americans have access to health care at zero cost to the American taxpayer.
For more than thirty years, the 340B program has been helping Americans access medications they might otherwise be unable to afford. The program is a bipartisan effort that granted pharmaceutical companies access to Medicare Part B and Medicaid markets in exchange for providing drugs to 340B hospitals, health centers, and clinics. That gave those companies access to approximately half of the U.S. population, and gave those hospitals–that serve predominantly rural and low-income patients–affordable medication for their patients.
J&J tried to refuse to offer the federally required rebate outright. Conservative Michigan representatives Bergman and Huizenga signed on to a letter calling them out on their threat, causing J&J to back down almost immediately. While large pharmaceutical companies dislike the program, it is vital to older and rural Americans. That hasn’t prevented them from spending incredible amounts of money lobbying to repeal the program—and now, simply ignoring the law. In many cases, pharmaceutical companies may have hoped the Republican Party would help them with their efforts, but they failed to notice a shift in the party over the last decade. The GOP is no longer the Big Pharma-friendly party it once was.
This message was delivered effectively by 189 members of Congress, including Michigan’s Bergman and Huizenga, demanding J&J change course—which they quickly did. As members of the Republican Study Committee, these are two solid conservatives, not “RINO” Republicans who do not reflect party sentiment. Their names being attached indicate that Republicans support 340B.
This is further supported by the fact that dark red, rural, conservative states like Arkansas and Louisiana have been leading on state laws designed to rein in the likes of J&J and big pharma writ large. There is a long history of large pharmaceutical companies refusing to offer these discounts and having to be sued for reimbursement. In the end, it is the patients who end up losing. While lobbying to make some questionable products available to minors without parental consent, these pharmaceutical companies are also fighting against providing medication for rural families and others who are struggling financially.
Michigan is lucky to have strong conservatives like Bergman and Huizenga standing up for them on this issue—but it’s too bad they have to. And now that Michigan has flipped back to being a red state, hopefully we can continue to elect more common sense conservative leaders who are willing to take on Big Pharma and protect patients.
Amelia Hamilton is a writer and communications professional from Michigan with more than a decade of experience in messaging to promote liberty.
