The New York Times - USA (2020-06-28)

THE NEW YORK TIMES NATIONALSUNDAY, JUNE 28, 2020 N 27

KREMMLING, Colo. — For
months, Democrats have figured
that Colorado’s U.S. Senate race, a
linchpin of their strategy to take
back the majority in November,
was essentially in the bag, with
the Republican incumbent Cory
Gardner trailing by double digits
behind their candidate John Hick-
enlooper, the well-liked and well-
known former two-term governor
and Denver mayor.
But Mr. Hickenlooper, who was
coaxed into the Senate contest af-
ter ending his brief presidential
run, has faltered in recent weeks
ahead of the primary race on
Tuesday. He now finds himself in a
tougher-than-expected contest
with Andrew Romanoff, a former
state House speaker and another
longtime Colorado political pres-
ence, in a fight with significant im-
plications for the general election
and control of the Senate.
At a time when Democrats
sense fresh momentum for flip-
ping the Senate amid national cri-
ses that have tarnished President
Trump and threaten to drag down
Republican candidates, Mr. Hick-
enlooper’s shaky primary per-
formance has been a rare dark
spot in an otherwise brightening
landscape. Democrats would have
a difficult time capturing the ma-
jority without a Centennial State
victory.
“He has had a bad June,” Kyle
Saunders, a political-science pro-
fessor at Colorado State Univer-
sity, said about Mr. Hickenlooper’s
multiple travails and missteps.
Chief among them was a con-
tempt finding by the state’s inde-
pendent ethics commission for de-
fying a subpoena to appear at a
hearing on a complaint against
him — an event that prompted dis-
astrous news coverage across the
state.
Experts still expect Mr. Hicken-
looper to win the primary —
though perhaps not by the margin
initially anticipated — and a re-
cent poll found him with a com-
manding lead over Mr. Romanoff
even as ballots are being cast un-
der Colorado’s vote-by-mail sys-
tem.
But Democrats worry that his
rockier-than-expected race may
leave him weakened for the gen-
eral-election fight and give Mr.

Gardner new life in a campaign

where he was a rare incumbent

underdog.

“He is limping out of this prima-

ry and now has a vulnerability

that didn’t exist several weeks

ago,” Dick Wadhams, a former

state Republican Party chairman

and veteran Senate campaign

strategist, said about Mr. Hicken-

looper and his run-in with the

ethics panel.

The unexpected volatility of the

primary — and the chance to in-

flict additional damage on Mr.

Hickenlooper — has generated a

last-minute surge of campaign ad-

vertising as national Republicans,

Mr. Gardner and Mr. Romanoff

have ganged up on Mr. Hicken-

looper from the right and the left,

while national Democrats and an

independent group have swooped

in to defend the former governor

in the primary’s closing days. Mil-

lions of dollars are being spent.

Mr. Hickenlooper’s troubles go

beyond the ethics complaint,

which accused him of having im-

properly accepted private jet and

limousine rides as governor.

In a series of forums and de-

bates with his opponent, Mr. Hick-

enlooper, 68, made several eye-

brow-raising statements. He said

that George Floyd, the black Min-

neapolis man who died after a po-

lice officer knelt on his neck, had

been shot. In response to a ques-

tion about the Black Lives Matter

movement, Mr. Hickenlooper said

that every life matters, a comment

considered dismissive of legiti-

mate black grievances. He later

acknowledged that he fumbled his

response.

Then a six-year-old video sur-

faced of Mr. Hickenlooper com-

paring the rigors of a politician’s

schedule to working on a slave

ship, a remark critics cited as

painfully insensitive. He again

apologized.

Months earlier, in rejecting ap-

peals to run for the Senate rather

than president, Mr. Hickenlooper

said multiple times that he was

not cut out for the Senate and

could not see being very good at it,

only to turn around and join the

race after getting no traction in his

White House bid.

Allies of Mr. Hickenlooper say

he has always lacked the verbal

discipline of a typical politician —

and that is part of the quirky, au-

thentic personality that voters

have come to appreciate and ad-

mire.

“Colorado voters know John

Hickenlooper really, really well,”

said Melissa Miller, a campaign

spokeswoman. “What people re-

ally like about him is he is a real

guy. He is not a slick, talking-point

politician.” (The campaign de-

clined to make Mr. Hickenlooper

available for an interview.)

Mr. Hickenlooper’s gaffes

would have provided negative

campaign fodder in any event, but

the biggest error came in his han-

dling of a complaint filed by Re-

publicans in 2018 that accused

him of improperly taking gifts and

private jet trips as governor.

Subpoenaed to testify on June 4

in a virtual hearing because of the

pandemic, Mr. Hickenlooper and

his legal adviser instead argued

for a delay so he could appear lat-

er in person without the distrac-

tions and glitches of an online pro-

ceeding. He was then a no-show

for the teleconference and the

ethics commission held him in

contempt, setting off a wave of

negative coverage that made it

appear as if he was not taking the

complaint seriously.

Chastened, Mr. Hickenlooper

testified the next day, defending

the trips as either personal busi-

ness or efforts to promote Col-

orado. But the commission even-

tually fined him $2,750 for two vio-

lations and refused to vacate its

contempt finding.

National Republicans, who

were always planning to hit Mr.

Hickenlooper on the ethics ques-

tion, accelerated their planned

post-primary advertising to take

advantage of the furor and aired a

spot that rounded up news cover-

age hammering the former gover-

nor.

“We did it because of how badly

Hick was mishandling the ethics

hearing,” said Kevin McLaughlin,

head of the National Republican

Senatorial Committee. “He and

his team were bumbling idiots,

and we felt like we couldn’t let the

opportunity pass.”

Mr. Romanoff, who lost a Den-

ver-area House race in 2014 and a

primary battle for the Senate in

2010, has also taken Mr. Hicken-

looper to task on the ethics issue,

drawing rebukes from other Dem-

ocrats who have urged him to drop

the attacks.

By embracing “Medicare for

all” and the Green New Deal, Mr.

Romanoff has sought to contrast

himself with Mr. Hickenlooper’s

more moderate image and tap into

the growing progressive bloc of

Colorado Democrats who helped

Senator Bernie Sanders of Ver-

mont win the state’s presidential

primary this year with 37 percent

of the vote.

Mr. Romanoff also said Mr.

Hickenlooper’s campaign effort

has validated the former gover-

nor’s original claim that he wasn’t

that interested in joining the Sen-

ate.

“We haven’t detected any en-

thusiasm for his candidacy, in-

cluding from him,” Mr. Romanoff

said in an interview. “I just think it

has been an appalling perform-

ance. There is nothing he has done

in this campaign to convince me

that he was wrong when he said

he would be a terrible senator.”

Hoping to counter Mr. Ro-

manoff’s criticism and a percep-

tion in some Democratic circles

that he is out of step with the

state’s evolving Democratic elec-

torate, the Hickenlooper cam-

paign has touted endorsements

from Washington figures such as

Senators Elizabeth Warren of

Massachusetts and Cory Booker

of New Jersey, both of whom

joined Mr. Hickenlooper in the

presidential primary field.

“I feel like the momentum has

changed in the last few days,” Mr.

Hickenlooper said in a local televi-

sion interview that aired on Fri-

day, crediting the national en-

dorsements and a rush of local

and state Democrats who

switched their backing from Mr.

Romanoff to him after an attack

ad from his rival.

With Mr. Hickenlooper under

fire, Mr. Gardner has also plunged

into the fray. His opening cam-

paign ad mocked Mr. Hickenloop-

er’s early comments about his

lack of interest in being in the Sen-

ate, with Mr. Gardner pretending

to be a therapist and noting that

Mr. Hickenlooper has some issues

to work through.

“To do this job, you probably

need to want this job,” a smiling

Mr. Gardner says at the end.

Republican strategists say they

believe that Mr. Gardner, a pol-

ished campaigner who led the

party’s Senate campaign organi-

zation in 2016, could hold off Mr.

Hickenlooper given the weak-

nesses the former governor has

displayed in the primary.

Yet even with Mr. Hickenloop-

er’s troubles, Democrats and ana-

lysts say that Mr. Gardner’s fate is

tied to that of Mr. Trump, who lost

the state in 2016 to Hillary Clinton

and is trailing former Vice Presi-

dent Joseph R. Biden Jr. in polls

here.

They say that Mr. Gardner, who

early on endorsed the president

for re-election, has not done

enough to separate himself from

Mr. Trump, who was an anchor on

the senator’s campaign even be-

fore the president’s most recent

decline in popularity.

“There is too much drag on him

from the president and it is getting

even worse,” said Floyd Ciruli, a

longtime pollster and Colorado

political analyst. “I just have a

hard time seeing Cory being able

to beat that tide.”

Hickenlooper Hits Unexpected Turbulence in Colorado Senate Race

By CARL HULSE

The popular John Hickenlooper had multiple travails and mis-

steps in June. Republican strategists say they believe that Sena-

tor Cory Gardner, below, now has a chance of beating him.

ERIN SCHAFF/THE NEW YORK TIMES

PETE MAROVICH FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

An ethics contempt

finding left a former

governor ‘limping.’

WASHINGTON — When Presi-
dent Trump visited Senate Repub-
licans last month for the first time
since the coronavirus pandemic
began ripping across the country,
Senator Charles E. Grassley, the
powerful chairman of the Finance
Committee, confronted him about
whether he still wanted to fulfill
his years-old promise of lowering
the cost of prescription drugs.
“You started this whole
process,” said Mr. Grassley, an
Iowa Republican who had drafted
such a plan, and whom Mr. Trump
had taken to calling early in the
morning to discuss the issue. “Are
you still interested in signing a
bill?”
The president said that he was,
according to a person in the room
that day, adding that the Senate
had “no choice” but to act. But the
exchange only underscored that
the drive to reduce pharmaceuti-
cal costs — once a marquee pri-
ority seen by both parties as a po-
litical imperative — has stalled at
the very moment when people
most need it.
Millions of Americans, includ-
ing droves of newly unemployed,
are stuck with increasing out-of-
pocket costs for medication in the
middle of a historic health crisis.
But the political will to address the
issue appears to have faded away.
“The problems are real.
They’ve only gotten bigger,” said
Tricia Neuman, a drug policy ex-
pert who directs the Medicare pol-
icy program at the Kaiser Family
Foundation. A solution, she said, is
on “life support.”
The politics have hardly
changed — prescription drug
prices have consistently ranked
as the top health care concern for
voters heading into the 2020 elec-
tion — but Senate Republicans
have shied away from acting and
Democrats have resisted making
concessions.
Now Mr. Grassley, working to
salvage the effort, is planning to
call for his bill to be included in the
next round of coronavirus relief
legislation that Congress is ex-
pected to consider later this sum-
mer, according to a senior Repub-
lican aide.
Senator Mitch McConnell, Re-
publican of Kentucky and the ma-
jority leader, who has raised more
than $200,000 from pharmaceuti-
cal companies so far this election
cycle, appears to be in no mood to
tackle the issue by bringing Mr.
Grassley’s measure to the floor. In
December, Mr. Grassley accused
him of sabotaging his bill.
Longtime patient advocates
now fear that the broad support
they built among lawmakers for
moving on the issue may be erod-
ing in the face of an even more
dramatic health crisis, one that
has also prompted a health insur-
ance emergency that has gone

largely unaddressed by the

Trump administration.

“All of the problems that pre-ex-

isted the pandemic are still there,

if you’re paying too much for insu-

lin, if you’re paying too much for

cancer drugs like I am,” said Da-

vid Mitchell, who founded Pa-

tients for Affordable Drugs and is

battling a blood cancer called mul-

tiple myeloma. “Nothing has

changed, except now we have mil-

lions of people who are unem-

ployed who have lost income, who

have lost insurance.”

Like Mr. Trump, Democrats

have said they support a bill to

lower drug costs, and the House

passed such a measure in Decem-

ber. Former Vice President Jo-

seph R. Biden Jr., the presumptive

Democratic presidential nominee,

released a sweeping prescription

drug plan last summer that went

far beyond what Mr. Grassley has

proposed.

Months ago, House Democrats

in politically competitive districts

were inundated at town hall meet-

ings with questions about drug

costs, and assumed the issue

would feature prominently in

their re-election campaigns.

Many Republicans in Congress

who have fretted about the politi-

cal risks of their party’s push to re-

peal the Affordable Care Act,

which the Trump administration

on Thursday asked the Supreme

Court to overturn, had hoped for

action on drug costs, eager to

show voters that they were willing

to address the most pressing

health care problems. Mr. Grass-

ley said that during his town hall

meetings in Iowa before the pan-

demic, a quarter of the time was

spent discussing prescription

drugs.

“It’s a pocketbook issue,” Ms.

Neuman said. “And it is one that

candidates who are Republicans

and Democrats all talk about.”

Americans spend tens of bil-

lions of dollars on prescription

drugs annually. Public health ex-

perts say that level of spending is

not surprising given how manu-

facturers keep debuting new

drugs at high prices while raising

prices on hundreds of drugs al-

ready on the market.

Prescription medicine use has

only intensified during the coro-

navirus crisis: Express Scripts, a

prescription benefit manager

with over 100 million customers,

saw spikes in March for three-

month refills and new prescrip-

tions for conditions associated

with higher coronavirus risk.

“The problem has expanded,”

said Representative Kim Schrier,

Democrat of Washington and a

pediatrician.

Because of border restrictions

amid the pandemic, Ms. Schrier

said, some in her state can no

longer drive to Canada to pur-

chase insulin at a fraction of what

it costs in the United States.

“There’s this fear that we’re going

to run out of medications, so peo-

ple are trying to get more in hand,”

she said.

Mr. Mitchell said that his group

had observed significant price in-

creases on drugs needed for coro-

navirus patients, including antico-

agulants for blood clots.

“There’s more of a sense of ur-

gency,” said Representative

Frank Pallone Jr., Democrat of

New Jersey and the main sponsor

of the House bill, called H.R. 3,

which was given a low number to

reflect its top ranking among

Democratic priorities. “So many

people have lost their jobs. So

many people have lost income.

They’re more conscious than ever

of the price of health care.”

Mr. Grassley’s bill would cap

the growth of drug prices in Medi-

care at inflation level, and impose

a $3,100 limit on out-of-pocket

costs for tens of millions of seniors

and Americans with disabilities

enrolled in its drug coverage pro-

gram. The plan would provide

nearly $100 billion in savings, ac-

cording to the Congressional

Budget Office.

The House bill goes further in

seeking to control the growth of

drug costs, calling for the secre-

tary of health and human services

to negotiate prices with manufac-

turers, a provision that is project-

ed to save more than $500 billion

over a decade, according to the

C.B.O. The House will vote on that

provision again as part of a bill it

plans to bring to the floor next

week to bolster the Affordable

Care Act.

The bills have faced predictable

but fierce resistance from phar-

maceutical companies, which law-

makers say are newly fortified as

a result of their work developing

coronavirus treatments, includ-

ing the most sought-after drug —

a vaccine — that could arrive next

year.

“They feel emboldened,” Mr.

Grassley said. “And I think they

feel that they don’t have to worry

about this bill.”

While the White House has

made little progress on the presi-

dent’s 2018 prescription drug ob-

jectives, it has made incremental

changes in line with some of the

congressional proposals. In May,

Mr. Trump announced that sen-

iors with diabetes could enroll

starting next year in Medicare

drug plans that would cap their

out-of-pocket insulin costs at $35

per month.

Lowering drug prices is the rare

issue for which Americans sup-

port more government interven-

tion. Majorities of Democrats and

Republicans believe Congress

should do more to regulate drug

prices. A majority of Americans

say they would even accept

higher taxes and fewer new drugs

being developed if it mean paying

less for prescription drugs.

The public’s mood is reflected in

Washington, where lowering drug

prices has been one of the few

causes with broad bipartisan sup-

port in Congress, giving the issue

momentum in a Senate with a thin

legislative record. Every Demo-

crat on the Finance Committee

voted for Mr. Grassley’s bill, and

the dozen Republicans who have

pledged support cover the ideo-

logical spectrum, from Senator

Steve Daines of Montana, a con-

servative ally of Mr. Trump’s, to

the more moderate Senator Susan

Collins of Maine. Both are running

for re-election this year, as are

Senators Joni Ernst of Iowa and

Martha McSally of Arizona, who

also back the bill.

Mr. Grassley has lobbied other

Republicans on the Senate floor

this year, making the pitch that he

represents a possible last chance

for a measured plan. His Republi-

can successor on the finance com-

mittee, Senator Michael D. Crapo

of Idaho, may be unfriendlier to

reform if Mr. Trump wins a second

term, and a Democratic adminis-

tration, he has said, would pass

something even less desirable.

But Mr. Grassley and his col-

leagues have yet to find a compro-

mise with House Democrats, and

the measure has stalled since its

approval by the Finance Commit-

tee. Democratic and Republican

aides in the House and Senate pri-

vately say that Mr. Trump, notori-

ously fickle and uninformed on

policy, could hasten a resolution

with a phone call to Mr. McCon-

nell, but he has chosen not to do

so. Vice President Mike Pence and

Alex M. Azar II, the health secre-

tary, have endorsed the legisla-

tion.

Late last month, Mr. Grassley

met with Speaker Nancy Pelosi

and policy aides to see whether a

compromise was still feasible, and

where components of their bills

might go. But little has come of it.

A final target could be late No-

vember, when Congress faces a

deadline to extend some health

care programs. But by then, in the

wake of the election, the political

landscape could look far different.

And voters may well have already

have exacted a political price for

Congress’s failure to move on the

issue.

“The issue does not go away”

without a deal, said Ms. Neuman,

the drug policy expert. “The ques-

tion is, will voters hold candidates

responsible for not taking ac-

tion?”

As the Coronavirus Spreads, Legislation on Drug Pricing Remains Stalled

By NOAH WEILAND

Senator Charles E. Grassley, the chairman of the Finance Committee, has introduced a plan to lower the cost of prescription drugs.

ERIN SCHAFF/THE NEW YORK TIMES

A banner policy issue

for both parties loses

ground during a crisis.