Sam Mar

[Sam Mar @SamJMar]

Prediction markets have effectively legalized sports gambling in all 50 states AND lowered the age to 18. Even if you like the concept of prediction markets, you can probably agree that giving every 18-year old in the country a casino in their pocket is not a great idea.

[Senator John Curtis @SenJohnCurtis]

If it looks and talks like gambling, it is gambling. Regulation of sports betting and casino-style prediction markets belongs to the states—not the federal government. Joined @SquawkCNBC to discuss our bill to keep these products out of spaces where they don’t belong.

[Vast @vast]

Vast hosted Congressman @Rep_Whitesides at our Long Beach headquarters. He toured our factory, Mission Control, and met with Founder Jed McCaleb, CEO @maxhaot, and engineers to discuss the future of commercial space stations and American's continuous presence in space.

[Mike Lee @SenMikeLee]

America can’t afford to lose the global race for energy.

A permitting process that drags projects out for years guarantees we will.

[John Arnold @johnarnold]

Shared the stage with Senators Lee (UT) & Heinrich (NM) and Govs Stitt (OK) & Shapiro (PA) tonight to discuss permitting reform. Likely no coincidence that each of us comes from energy-exporting states and see firsthand how hard it is to build infrastructure the country needs.

[Sam Mar @SamJMar]

Thank you @RepJasonSmith for calling out the need for greater accountability of Organ Procurement Organizations

[NEWSMAX @NEWSMAX]

Heather Knuckles shares her mother's tragic story of receiving a liver with metastatic cancer, prompting calls for accountability in organ procurement practices.

@SchmittNYC

[Sam Mar @SamJMar]

Thank you @RepAaronBean for shining a light on the need for reform in the organ donation system. This is one issue that both sides of the aisle can and do agree on - saving lives and taxpayer dollars by holding low-performing OPOs accountable. These are nonprofit government contractors abusing public trust and wasting taxpayer dollars.

[Aaron Bean @RepAaronBean]

WATCH: In today’s @WaysandMeansGOP Oversight Subcommittee hearing, I exposed the rampant waste, fraud, and abuse in the organ procurement industry.

I look forward to working with @HouseGOP to restore trust in the transplant system and prevent this outrageous and shockingly evil abuse of taxpayer dollars.

[Eli Dourado @elidourado]

There are $250B sitting in DAFs. What if donor-advisors could use funds for private loan guarantees for FOAK projects or facilities? Would it help the country reindustrialize? 🤔 At Astera, we're going to try it.

[Santi Ruiz @rSanti97]

Listening to Jennifer Erickson present on this right now — insanely talented communicator and policy entrepreneur.

Highly recommend this episode purely as a study in selling a wonky policy idea.

[Holly Harris @holly_harris]

Thank you @SenMikeLee for leading the charge on this important legislation! Great to see the band back together again, this time with some new friends! @JessicaJackson https://t.co/rLd4cQ9YlP

[Governor Kelly Armstrong @GovArmstrong]

North Dakota feeds and fuels the world, it would be great if it was easier (and cheaper) to get our products to market.

[John Arnold @johnarnold]

Love seeing two of my favorite governors coming together on one of my favorite topics.

[Prachee Avasthi @PracheeAC]

Right now is the best chance the scientific community has ever had to end the artificial scarcity of academic journals.

Check out my new op-ed urging @NIH @NIHDirector_Jay to disallow taxpayer dollars towards journal publication fees — something both publishers and scientists have played a role in perpetuating.

The last day for public comment on this topic is Monday, Sept 15. It’s time to unleash science.

Links in 🧵

[Governor Cox @GovCox]

Between 1970 and 1990, America built 95 gigawatts of nuclear capacity. But then momentum stalled: regulation tightened, costs soared, and we gradually lost the will and ability to build.

Today, China is racing ahead. With 30 reactors under construction and hundreds of gigawatts in the pipeline, they’re on track to quickly surpass U.S. nuclear capacity.

It’s time for a nuclear renaissance — for energy abundance, for national security, and for American prosperity. It’s time to build again.

[Sam Mar @SamJMar]

you can't argue that biologics are more complex and need more exclusivity than pills and in the same breath whine that there is a pill penalty. It should be obvious that the real play here is to just defer Medicare negotiation for all drugs as long as possible.

[Sam Mar @SamJMar]

The EPIC Act is a pharma handout. If you want to eliminate the "pill penalty", shorten the biologic exclusivity period to 9 yrs to achieve parity with pills. This would be good for patients (make more drugs affordable sooner) and taxpayers (reduce the deficit or pay for tax cuts). You don't get lower drug prices by lengthening exclusivity. That's called a taxpayer-funded giveaway to line pharma's pockets at the expense of patients.

[John Arnold @johnarnold]

A post on drug patents, exclusivity periods, and Medicare negotiation, and how pharma is trying to use the complexity to pull a fast one to grab $10 billion.

A pharma company gets 20 years of patent protection on a drug, starting from date of filing. However, due to lengthy clinical trials and reg approval, the effective patent life can be materially shorter.

Given this, the industry pushed for other protections including an exclusivity period free from generic competition starting at the date of drug approval. Hatch-Waxman established a 5-year exclusivity period for small molecules. When the ACA created a pathway for biosimilars (essentially generic biologic drugs), pharma argued that biologics are more complex and costly to develop and should get a longer time. In exchange for industry support for the ACA, the Obama admin granted a longer exclusivity period for biologics: 12 years.

The provisions for Medicare negotiations in the IRA follow this precedent, with biologics getting 13 years before being eligible for price negotiation vs 9 for small molecule.

But now pharma has flipped the rhetoric. Instead of biologics getting extra years, the new phrase is a "pill penalty." They are arguing that small molecule drugs are now at a disadvantage and that Medicare negotiation timing should be aligned. Of course, they're not arguing that biologics should not get the added years, or that instead of one being 9 and the other 13 that it could be averaged to 11, but that pills should also now get 13 years. This is despite decades of argument that biologics are different and deserve more.

Pharma has gotten some support from members of Congress (remember, pharma ranks among the top spenders on federal lobbying.). The EPIC Act removes the so-called "pill penalty" and would mandate 13 years before small molecule drugs be eligible for negotiation. This would cost the federal govt $10 billion and hurt access by patients.

In an executive order last month entitled "Lowering Drug Prices by Once Again Putting Americans First," Trump specifically called out the "pill penalty" and wrote the HHS Secretary should work with Congress to: "align the treatment of small molecule prescription drugs with that of biological products, ending the distortion that undermines relative investment in small molecule prescription drugs, coupled with other reforms to prevent any increase in overall costs to Medicare and its beneficiaries."

The order specifically acknowledges that it would raise costs but then makes hand gestures that some unmentioned action should also happen to make sure it doesn't. This does not "Lower Drug Prices" as the title suggests. Meanwhile, the administration is putting out feelers for other ways to reduce costs. Step 1 is to stop considering policies that increase them.

Drug lobbyists did a great job and should get a big bonus this year. But if we want lower pharma costs, more access, and lower deficits, the biologic premium should be brought down to match small molecules, not the other way around.

[Sam Mar @SamJMar]

@JosephMajkut Just a few more PDFs and we will have a $100/ton carbon tax

[Elizabeth Whitehouse @ElizWhitehouse]

Guthrie will make big impact for Kentucky as House Energy and Commerce Chair. A great reminder from @holly_harris and a sweet story about her Mom, @RoseWilsonHarri in this Op-Ed about Kentucky’s own @brettguthrie.

https://t.co/FnLmos6dbx

[John Arnold @johnarnold]

Some Republicans are asking whether to wait until 2025 with a trifecta to do energy permitting reform. But not only is a materially different bill not possible in the 119th Congress due to the political process and landscape, it's dangerous to delay it.

- Hyperscalers are looking to site their largest, most important data centers overseas because they can't get the power and gas they need in the US
- Consumers are seeing rising retail prices because it's too hard and takes too long to build energy infrastructure
- RTOs and ISOs are all facing difficulty keeping reliability of the system given the growth in demand
- Energy companies of all types are cancelling projects because of difficulty of permits

The next Congress has many issues of higher priority to deal with. Even if/when it gets to it, the bill cannot go through reconciliation. It will need at least 7 Dem votes in the Senate. There is no chance a bill as imagined by certain conservative groups would get that. The issue would be stuck and the industry, and consumers, would be waiting years.

[Jennifer Doleac @jenniferdoleac]

I have an op-ed in the @nytimes today about how to reduce crime.
The key idea, based on decades of strong research evidence: focus on increasing the probability of getting caught, not the punishment.

https://t.co/Z90t7asnUx

[Alec Stapp @AlecStapp]

This is the way forward for the Democratic Party:

Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, Jared Golden, and the rest of the Blue Dogs sent a letter calling for Congress to pass the bipartisan permitting reform bill.