A clip is going viral of Trump’s Health and Human Services secretary nominee Robert F. Kennedy and Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders arguing yesterday at Kennedy’s confirmation hearing over the senator’s pharmaceutical industry contributions.
“The problem of corruption is not just in the federal agencies. It’s in Congress too,” Kennedy said. “Almost all the members of this panel, including yourself, are accepting millions of dollars from the pharmaceutical industry and protecting their interests.”
“No, no, no,” Sanders responded. “I ran for president like you. I got millions and millions of contributions. They did not come from the executives, not one nickel of PAC money from the pharmaceutical industry. They came from the workers.”
Kennedy went on to say that Sanders was the largest receiver of pharmaceutical industry dollars in 2020, with $1.5 million.
While Kennedy’s point about massive drugmaker donations to lawmakers may be generally correct—the pharmaceutical industry does have tremendous undue influence in politics, including among his opponents—it’s almost completely not true in Bernie’s case.
The figures Kennedy cited almost certainly came from OpenSecrets, the widely-used campaign finance tracking website that categorizes donors by industry. For 2020, OpenSecrets says Sanders received more than $1.4 million from the pharmaceuticals/health products industry, and for 2016 it says he got $439,000. OpenSecrets tallies Kennedy’s pharmaceuticals/health products industry contributions for the 2024 cycle at $325,000.
According to these figures, in 2020, Sanders’ campaign did receive more money from the pharmaceutical industry than any other member of Congress. But a closer examination shows that with perhaps just a few exceptions the money in OpenSecrets’ tallies came from rank-and-file employees looking to support Sanders’ campaign and not from executives, lobbyists, or PACs that often use their contributions to support their companies’ political interests.
During his 2020 campaign, Sanders pledged to reject all contributions over $200 from the PACs, executives, and lobbyists of pharmaceutical and health insurance companies. His campaign website listed the drug companies that are members of the largest pharma trade association in the country, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, and specified that the pledge did not apply to donations from rank-and-file workers.
Campaign donors have to report their employers and occupations to the Federal Election Commission, and OpenSecrets uses that information to determine which industry to categorize a donation in. OpenSecrets tallies up money donated by company and trade group PACs, plus money donated by company employees, to generate industry totals. To get the full picture though you have to look at the source data from the FEC.
