Big Pharma Windfall – Conservatives for Lower Health Care Costs

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Jon Tester Lost Senate Race And They’re Still Running Negative Ads Against Him

The ads trace back to a group called Conservatives for Lower Health Care Costs (CLHCC), which is registered in Delaware by the Corporation Trust Co. in Wilmington, Delaware. That company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Wolters Kluwer, a multi-national information services company based in the Netherlands with operations in more than 35 countries.

David Feider, a spokesman at Wolters Kluwer, said in an email that the company serves as the registered agent “for literally hundreds of thousands of businesses across the country.”

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Brendan Glavin, deputy research director with OpenSecrets — a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit dedicated to tracking money in politics — said of the latest round of attack ads in Montana, “It is unique to see this right after the election and to have it outside of the election cycle, but it is pretty common to see these competing business interests attacking each other and using these sort of groups with generic names. Reducing health care costs or whatever, who’s against that?”

As for why Conservatives for Lower Health Care Costs registered in Delaware through a multinational company, Glavin said, “That happens a lot in Delaware because of the law there and they set up these corporations and it allows whoever’s behind it to hide behind that. 

“They don’t have to report or do any kind of reporting with the Federal Election Commission for this kind of activity. This is a vehicle that they can use to try to influence policy in a way that would be beneficial to them and keep it under wraps.”

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The current anti-delinking commercial that accuses Tester of handing “Big Pharma” a windfall could be an effort in support of pharmacy benefits managers.