New reporting from Axios underscores that MAGA Republicans in Congress care more about cozying up to Big Phara than helping seniors afford the prescription drugs they need as they plot to repeal President Biden and Vice President Harris’ historic Inflation Reduction Act. 

Rolling back the Inflation Reduction Act is a key component of Trump’s Project 2025 agenda. If Republicans scrap Medicare drug price negotiations from this historic law, which is already lowering costs for seniors, over 18 million Americans are expected to see price hikes and it will cost Medicare Part D enrollees a total of $7.4 billion — an average cost increase of $399 per enrollee. 

Axios: Hill GOP sets sights on scrapping drug price talks
By Peter Sullivan

Key Point: “Multiple high-ranking Republicans told Axios they want to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act’s Medicare drug price negotiations next year if they prevail in the elections. […] “By the numbers: The Congressional Budget Office found that the negotiation provisions would save about $100 billion over 10 years.”

• The big picture: The tension surfaced this week when multiple high-ranking Republicans told Axios they want to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act’s Medicare drug price negotiations next year if they prevail in the elections.
  
  
• [Trump] could still be open to repealing the IRA drug price measures, and his campaign isn’t elaborating.

• What they’re saying: “I would try to remove that and replace it, but I can’t tell you the exact, you know, what it would be yet,” Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), who’s in line to be the next chair of the Senate Finance Committee if Republicans flip the chamber, told Axios when asked about the drug price talks.

• Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said he “100%” wants to repeal the negotiation provisions, while other drug pricing sections of the law would need to be evaluated based on whether they have “a positive impact on business.”

• Yes, but: The lack of a consensus replacement plan could mean a long, grinding health care debate with echoes of the failed 2017 Affordable Care Act repeal-replace fight.

• By the numbers: The Congressional Budget Office found that the negotiation provisions would save about $100 billion over 10 years.

• Vice President Kamala Harris has called for expanding the negotiations and making more drugs subject to price talks, if she’s elected.

• And congressional Democrats are trying to showcase how the talks are already yielding savings for seniors and working-class Americans, through forums like a hearing today in the Senate Finance Committee.