Big Tobacco, Health Care Industry Team Up to Fund Prop. 1 Campaign

Big Tobacco, Health Care Industry Team Up to Fund Prop. 1 Campaign

by Dan Bacher

Tobacco giant Philip Morris and the robber barons from the health care and insurance industry have joined a rogue's gallery of corporate agribusiness interests, Big Oil and greedy billionaires in funding the campaign to pass Prop. 1, Governor Jerry Brown's water bond boondogle.

The California Hospitals Committee on Issues, sponsored by California Association of Hospitals and Health Systems has contributed $500,000 to the Yes on Prop. 1 and 2 campaign, according to the California Fair Political Practices Commission website.

Dignity Health has donated $250,000 to the campaign. The organization, a three-state hospital chain based in San Francisco has agreed to pay the government $37 million to settle claims that it overbilled Medicare and a military health care program for years, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

"The Justice Department said Dignity, formerly known as Catholic Healthcare West, submitted bills for inpatient care at 13 of its 39 hospitals in California, Nevada and Arizona that should have been charged at less-expensive outpatient rates," the Chronicle said. http://www.sfgate.com/health/article/Dignity-Health-to-pay-37-million-to-settle-5859535.php

Philip Morris, the largest tobacco company in the United States, contributed $100,000 to Governor Brown’s ballot measure committee established to support Propositions 1& 2.

On October 20, the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN) strongly encouraged the governor to return those funds.

ACS CAN recently launched its “Snuff Tobacco Money out of California Politics” campaign requesting that all candidates for state office reject campaign contributions, including donations to committees controlled by a candidate such as Governor Brown’s Yes on Prop 1 & 2 Committee.

Under ACS CAN criteria, Gov. Brown is the first candidate for office in the state to accept a campaign contribution from a tobacco company since the effort was launched on July 1.

“Gov. Brown should return this money right away,” said Jim Knox, vice president of government relations for ACS CAN in California. “Propositions 1 and 2 are important public policy debates, but the tobacco companies are cynically using these measures to curry favor with the governor. Philip Morris doesn’t care about water or a rainy day fund. They only care about addicting youth and low-income communities to their deadly products."

"This contribution is all about trying to prevent any policies that help people quit smoking, keep youth from ever starting to smoke and reduce exposure to secondhand smoke. Allowing convicted racketeers to fund his ballot measure committee is a mistake," Knox said.

Knox said tobacco companies inflict enormous harm on our state. A brand new report from researchers at the University of California, San Francisco shows that tobacco costs our state $18.1 billion a year. That comes out to $487 per Californian and $4,603 and per smoker.

Almost 15 percent of deaths in California in 2009 are attributed to smoking, for a total of 34,363 deaths. This represents $6.8 billion in lost productivity and 587,000 years of potential life lost.

"Across the globe, tobacco kills 5 million people a year and if current trends hold, a billion people will die this century from tobacco use," according to Knox. "ACS CAN calls on the governor to return the money. Opponents to Proposition 1 have raised virtually no money and Proposition 2 does not even have a campaign committee to oppose it."

The debate over the pros and cons of Proposition 1, Jerry Brown's $7.5 billion water bond, is very important, but an even larger issue in any environmental battle or process is the money behind the campaign. The big corporate money behind the water bond largely determines who the bond will benefit - billionaires, corporate agribusiness, oil companies and the 1 percent, not the people, fish or wildlife of California.

Contributions to Governor Jerry Brown's Yes on Props 1 and 2 Committee have jumped to $13,880,528.43, according to the latest data posted on the California Secretary of State's website. The contributions feature millions of dollars from billionaires, corporate agribusiness, Big Oil and the tobacco industry - corporate interests that all expect a big return for their "investment" in the corrupt "play to pay" politics that rule California today. (http://cal-access.ss.ca.gov/Campaign/Committees/Detail.aspx?id=1343257&session=2013)

But this isn’t the only committee funding the Yes on 1 campaign. When you consider the other committees backing Prop.1 listed on the Secretary of State’s website, the total amount of contributions jumps by another $2,541,257.91 to $16,421,785.91!

For more information about the corporate money being dumped into Big Oil Brown's Prop. 1 campaign, go to: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/10/30/1340324/-Goliath-Gets-Bigger-Prop-1-Campaign-War-Chest-Grows-to-16-4-Million