Round and Round It Spins - Our Latest Health Care Revolving Door Roundup

Sorry about the bad pun.  We have accumulated a remarkable number of stories of people transiting the revolving door from working for health care corporations in various but important capacities to positions in health care policy or regulation for the Trump administration.  These stories may not always appear in the most prominent places, but their accumulation suggests they should be of prominent importance.

As the New York Times reported on May 22, 2017, the Trump administration initially promised to drain the swamp, and specifically to prevent people who had lobbied the government from taking government positions with decision making power over their former employers' scope of interests.

President Trump signed an executive order in late January — echoing language first endorsed by Mr. Obama — that prohibited lobbyists and lawyers hired as political appointees from working for two years on 'particular' government matters that involved their former clients. In the case of former lobbyists, they could not work on the same regulatory issues they had been involved in.

Furthermore,

Both Mr. Trump and Mr. Obama reserved the right to issue waivers to this ban. Mr. Obama, unlike Mr. Trump, automatically made any such waivers public, offering detailed explanations. The exceptions were typically granted for people with special skills, or when the overlap between the new federal work and a prior job was minor.

However,

The Trump administration, in a significant escalation of its clash with the government’s top ethics watchdog, has moved to block an effort to disclose the names of former lobbyists who have been granted waivers to work in the White House or federal agencies.

The latest conflict came in recent days when the White House, in a highly unusual move, sent a letter to Walter M. Shaub Jr., the head of the Office of Government Ethics, asking him to withdraw a request he had sent to every federal agency for copies of the waivers. In the letter, the administration challenged his legal authority to demand the information.

In any case, information about people transiting the revolving door from health care lobbying firms has been coming out only in bits and pieces, as has information about people transiting from other health care positions.  I have been filing the information I can find about such people and present what I have found since May, 2017 here in chronological order.

Matthew Bassett from Senior Vice President for Government Affairs at Health Management Company myNEXUS to Assistant Secretary for Legislation at Department of Health and Human Services [DHHS]

Documented by the Nashville Post, May 5, 2017

Note that the article also stated that Mr Bassett "previously worked as a health care consultant and with ReviveHealth and DaVita"

Bruce Greenstein  from Health Care Technology Company Quartet to Chief Technology Officer, DHHS

As reported by Healthcare IT News on June 9, 2017

He previously

was CEO of Blend Health Insights, a consulting firm that advised health systems, payers, health IT companies and private equity firms in the U.S. and abroad on topics such as risk-based contracting, value-based purchasing and population health management.

Before that he

served as Secretary of the Department of Health and Hospitals in the administration of Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal.

However

That position ended in controversy, however, when he resigned in 2013 amid accusations that he'd had improper communications related to a $197 million Medicaid contract awarded to a company, Client Network Services, Inc., where he had worked. Jindal canceled the contract, and Greenstein was indicted for perjury. The case was dismissed by the Louisiana Attorney General in 2016.

Oops. So in this case, there were at least previous allegations of corrupt behavior as well, although they remain unproven.

On June 15, 2017, the Intercept reported on several revolving door travelers.  These included:

Eric Hargan from Lobbying for UnitedHealthcare for Greenberg Traurig Alston & Bird to Deputy Secretary, DHHS

Also,

Paula Stannard  from Lobbying for UnitedHealthcare for Greenberg Traurig Alston & Bird to Senior Counselor to the Secretary, DHHS

Note that we previously posted on Ms Stannard's earlier position on a Trump "beachhead team" at DHHS.  At that time we noted that Greenberg Traurig Alston & Bird "has earned more than $4.4 million lobbying so far this year for health care companies and trade groups including Novartis AG, Verax Biomedical, the American Hospital Association, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, and Aetna...."

Randolph Wayne Pate from Vice President for Public Policy at Health Care Services Corporation to Associate Deputy Secretary, DHHS

That corporation operates Blue Cross Blue Shield plans in five states.

Keagan Lenihan from Lobbyist for McKesson Specialty Health to Senior Counselor, Secretary of DHHS

Note that we had posted about his previous position on a "beachhead team" here.

 The article also noted Lance Leggitt moving from Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz to Chief of Staff for the Secretary of DHHS.  We had previously posted about that position in May.

On June 21, 2017, Public Citizen published "The Swamp Nominees" which included 115 sub-cabinet appointments with questionable antecedents.   These included Mr Hargan, and Mr Bassett above.  They also included two people whom we had previously discussed, Dr Scott Gottlibe, Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Seema Verma, Administrator, Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and Brett Giroir, Assistant Secretary, DHHS.  However, there were quite a few more on ProPublica list, including...

Stephen Parente from Principal, Health Systems Innovation Network LLC to Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, DHHS

Robert Charrow from Greenberg Taurig LLP and Registered Lobbyist, Intrexon Corp to General Counsel, DHHS

Note that Mr Charrow as "principal shareholder" of Greenberg Taurig which "represents providers, scientists, pharmaceutical companies...."  I assume that this Greenberg Taurig is the same firm as that referred to as Greenberg Taurig Alston & Bird above.

Finally, on August 31, 2017, ProPublica reported,

Joe Grogan from Lobbyist from Gilead to White House Working Group on Drug Prices

Note that Gilead was first to market with a new group of extremely expensive drugs to treat hepatitis C.  As we have discussed, there is no evidence so far that these drugs avert the severe complications of hepatitis C or increase longevity.  Furthermore, per ProPublica

As reported by Kaiser Health News, internal documents from the working group show that, despite vows by President Trump to lower the price of medications, Grogan’s team is pushing pharma-friendly policies, such as extending a drug’s patent time in foreign markets. Grogan and the Office of Management and Budget did not respond to requests for comment.

This suggests that this particular instance of the revolving door is leading to regulatory capture.

Obama Administration Officials Transiting to Industry

During the same period, in the interest of fairness, we also note that some former Obama administration health care policy or regulatory officials now have industry positions, including

Dr Robert Califf former FDA Commissioner to Google subsidiary Verity

Per StatNews on May 17, 2017

Note that Dr Califf transited the revolving door in the opposite direction in 2015 when he became FDA leader, as we noted here.

Kevin Coulihan, former CEO of HealthCare.gov to Centene

Per the St Louis Post-Dispatch, August 2, 2017,

Drew Littman former Counselor for DHHS to Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck LLP

Per the Washington Examiner, Aug 14, 2017,

Note that this law firm has clients that "include companies in the healthcare and biotechnology fields."

Discussion

The revolving door has been a chronic problem for the US, but seems to only be getting worse.  We saw plenty of examples of people transiting the door to or from the US executive branch during the George W Bush and Obama administrations.  We are still seeing people transiting the door from the latter administration.  However, the number of people transiting the door into the Trump administration seems unprecedented, although admittedly that impression is based on series of cases, not systematic quantitative studies.

So, as I have said before, most recently in August, 2017,


The revolving door is a species of conflict of interest. Worse, some experts have suggested that the revolving door is in fact corruption.  As we noted here, the experts from the distinguished European anti-corruption group U4 wrote,

The literature makes clear that the revolving door process is a source of valuable political connections for private firms. But it generates corruption risks and has strong distortionary effects on the economy, especially when this power is concentrated within a few firms.

The ongoing parade of people transiting the revolving door from industry to the Trump administration once again suggests how the revolving door may enable certain of those with private vested interests to have excess influence, way beyond that of ordinary citizens, on how the government works, and that the country is still increasingly being run by a cozy group of insiders with ties to both government and industry. This has been termed crony capitalism. The latest cohort of revolving door transits suggests that regulatory capture is likely to become much worse in the near future.

So, as we have said before [before, before...] The continuing egregiousness of the revolving door in health care shows how health care leadership can play mutually beneficial games, regardless of the their effects on patients' and the public's health.  Once again, true health care reform would cut the ties between government and corporate leaders and their cronies that have lead to government of, for and by corporate executives rather than the people at large.