Democratic Governors’ Fundraising Trails Republicans, Except When It Comes To Big Pharma

The Democratic Governors Association’s fundraising fell well short of the haul brought in by its Republican counterpart in the first half of 2017, newly released documents show.  While the Republican Governors Association (RGA) raised $36 million in the first six months of this year, the DGA raised just $21 million, according to DGA IRS records reviewed by International Business Times.

While the DGA, which is currently led by Connecticut Gov. Dan Malloy, received contributions from a variety of industries and individuals — including a $2 million donation from Illinois gubernatorial hopeful J.B. Pritzker, the largest single donation the group received this year — the pharmaceutical industry was perhaps the most generous. Two dozen drug developers, manufacturers and distributors accounted for nearly $2 million of the DGA’s first-half fundraising haul. That’s nearly exactly the same amount the industry gave to the RGA over the same period.

The donations from big pharma come as the political debate surrounding both the opioid epidemic and rising pharmaceutical prices has migrated from the halls of Congress to the states. Illinois, Mississippi, Ohio, Oklahoma and Missouri have sued opioid manufacturers in the last year over misleading marketing practices that the states allege have contributed to the epidemic. There have been 1,000 bills and resolutions filed in state legislatures related to pharmaceutical products so far in 2017, according to the bipartisan National Conference of State Legislatures. That’s compared to 1,200 in all of 2016 and 1,186 in 2015.

Continue to ibtimes.com article: http://www.ibtimes.com/political-capital/democratic-governors-fundraising-trails-republicans-except-when-it-comes-big