Rep. Kathleen Rice recently betrayed everyday New Yorkers who can’t afford the medicines they need to stay healthy and alive. She voted against including the “Lower Drug Costs Now Act” (HR 3) in the “Build Back Better” budget bill that Congress is currently developing. The mega-profitable drug corporations are fiercely opposing this bill.

• HR3 will dramatically lower drug costs for people in the US by directing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices with drug makers. (People in the US are charged up to three times more for our medicines than those in other advanced countries because their governments all negotiate prices and ours doesn’t.)
• HR3 will use the Medicare savings to add dental, vision, and hearing benefits to Medicare, and to lower the Medicare eligibility age.
• HR3 will also help to pay for other health care parts of President Biden’s “Build Back Better” plan, like expanding Medicaid to more low-income people, expanding home and community-based long-term care for seniors and people living with disabilities, making Affordable Care Act coverage more affordable to those who have to buy their own insurance, and strengthening the Child Health Insurance Program.

All these ideas are very popular with New Yorkers, so why is Rep. Rice voting against them?