10-17-2017 Now in a joint investigation by 60 Minutes and The Washington Post,
Joe Rannazzisi is a tough, blunt former DEA deputy assistant administrator with a law degree, a pharmacy degree and a smoldering rage at the unrelenting death toll from opioids. His greatest ire is reserved for the distributors -- some of them multibillion dollar, Fortune 500 companies. They are the middlemen that ship the pain pills from manufacturers, like Purdue Pharma and Johnson & Johnson to drug stores all over the country. Rannazzisi accuses the distributors of fueling the opioid epidemic by turning a blind eye to pain pills being diverted to illicit use.
BILL WHITAKER: Who are these distributors?
JOE RANNAZZISI: The three largest distributors are Cardinal Health, McKesson, and AmerisourceBergen. They control probably 85 or 90 percent of the drugs going downstream
JOE RANNAZZISI These weren't kids slinging crack on the corner. These were professionals who were doing it. They were just drug dealers in lab coats.
JIM GELDHOF: And I can tell you with 100 percent accuracy that we were in there on multiple occasions trying to get them to change their behavior. And they just flat out ignored us.
In 2008, the DEA slapped McKesson, the country's largest drug distributor, with a $13.2 million dollar fine. That same year, Cardinal Health paid a $34 million fine. Both companies were penalized by the DEA for filling hundreds of suspicious orders -- millions of pills.
Over the last seven years, distributors' fines have totaled more than $341 million. The companies cried foul and complained to Congress that DEA regulations were vague and the agency was treating them like a foreign drug cartel.
Rannazzisi says the drug industry used that money and influence to pressure top lawyers at the DEA to take a softer approach. Former DEA attorney Jonathan Novak said it divided the litigation office. He said in 2013, he noticed a sea change in the way prosecutions of big distributors were handled. Cases his supervisors once would have easily approved, now weren't good enough.
Rannazzisi says the drug industry used that money and influence to pressure top lawyers at the DEA to take a softer approach. Former DEA attorney Jonathan Novak said it divided the litigation office. He said in 2013, he noticed a sea change in the way prosecutions of big distributors were handled. Cases his supervisors once would have easily approved, now weren't good enough.
a new threat surfaced on Capitol Hill. With the help of members of Congress, the drug industry began to quietly pave the way for legislation that essentially would strip the DEA of its most potent tool in fighting the spread of dangerous narcotics.
JOE RANNAZZISI: If I was gonna write a book about how to harm the United States with pharmaceuticals, the only thing I could think of that would immediately harm is to take the authority away from the investigative agency that is trying to enforce the Controlled Substances Act and the regulations implemented under the act. And that's what this bill did.
The bill, introduced in the House by Pennsylvania Congressman Tom Marino and Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, was promoted as a way to ensure that patients had access to the pain medication they needed.
Jonathan Novak, who worked in the DEA's legal office, says what the bill really did was strip the agency of its ability to immediately freeze suspicious shipments of prescription narcotics to keep drugs off U.S. streets -- what the DEA calls diversion.
JONATHAN NOVAK: You're not gonna be able to hold anyone higher up the food chain accountable….
a new threat surfaced on Capitol Hill. With the help of members of Congress, the drug industry began to quietly pave the way for legislation that essentially would strip the DEA of its most potent tool in fighting the spread of dangerous narcotics.
JOE RANNAZZISI: If I was gonna write a book about how to harm the United States with pharmaceuticals, the only thing I could think of that would immediately harm is to take the authority away from the investigative agency that is trying to enforce the Controlled Substances Act and the regulations implemented under the act. And that's what this bill did.
The bill, introduced in the House by Pennsylvania Congressman Tom Marino and Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, was promoted as a way to ensure that patients had access to the pain medication they needed.
Jonathan Novak, who worked in the DEA's legal office, says what the bill really did was strip the agency of its ability to immediately freeze suspicious shipments of prescription narcotics to keep drugs off U.S. streets -- what the DEA calls diversion.
JONATHAN NOVAK: You're not gonna be able to hold anyone higher up the food chain accountable….Linden Barber used to work for the DEA. He wrote the Marino bill.
Barber went through the revolving door. He left his job as associate chief counsel of the DEA and within a month joined a law firm where he lobbied Congress on behalf of drug companies and wrote legislation. He advertised what he could offer a client facing DEA scrutiny.
Joe Rannazzisi had been a witness before Congress more than 30 times and was called on again to testify about this bill.
JOE RANNAZZISI: I've never accused Congressman Marino of helping criminals. I said that this bill is going to protect defendants that we have under investigation. And if Congressman Marino thinks I accused him of something, I don't know what to tell you.
But a week after the hearing on legislation that would hobble the DEA's enforcement authority, Marino and Blackburn wrote the inspector general for the Justice Department, demanding that Rannazzisi be investigated for trying to quote "intimidate the United States Congress."
In the end, the DEA signed off on the final version of the "Marino bill." A senior DEA representative told us the agency fought hard to stop it, but in the face of growing pressure from Congress and industry lobbyists, was forced to accept a deal it did not want. The bill was presented to the Senate in March of 2016….
JOE RANNAZZISI: I just don't understand why Congress would pass a bill that strips us of our authority in the height of an opioid epidemic in places like Congressman Marino's district and Congressman Blackburn's district….I think that the drug industry -- the manufacturers, wholesalers, distributors and chain drugstores -- have an influence over Congress that has never been seen before. And these people came in with their influence and their money and got a whole statute changed because they didn't like it.
Seven months after the bill became law, Congressman Marino's point man on the legislation, his Chief of Staff Bill Tighe, became a lobbyist for the National Association of Chain Drug Stores.
Since the crackdown on the distributors began, the pharmaceutical industry and law firms that represent them have hired at least 46 investigators, attorneys and supervisors from the DEA, including 32 directly from the division that regulates the drug industry. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ex-dea-agent-opioid-crisis-fueled-by-drug-industry-and-congress/
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8-22-20 Maryanne Trump Barry said of Donald Trimp, her younger brother, during 15 hours recorded in 2018 and 2019: “He has no principles. None. None.”…At one point Barry said to her niece, “It’s the phoniness of it all. It’s the phoniness and this cruelty. Donald is cruel.”…
In a conversation that Barry had with her niece on Nov. 1, 2018 Barry told how she tried to help her brother get into college. “He was a brat,” Barry said, explaining that “I did his homework for him; I drove him around New York City to try to get him into college.”…
Around the same time the conversations were being conducted, an internal investigation was underway of whether Barry (as a judge) violated judicial conduct rules regarding her role in working with her siblings in determining their tax liability. The investigation stemmed in part from an action that Mary Trump had taken. She had provided boxes of family tax records to the New York Times, which published a Pulitzer Prize-winning report in 2018 that found the president had engaged in suspect tax schemes that increased the family wealth. Barry retired shortly after the investigation was launched, which ended the probe….
The president has said he got into what was then called the Wharton School of Finance at Penn — which he called one of “the hardest schools to get in to” — because he is a “super genius.” The Post reported last year, however, that Mary’s father, Fred Jr., was close friends with a Penn admissions official. That official, James Nolan, told The Post that Fred Jr. asked him to interview his brother for admission, which he did. He was granted a place at the school, which Nolan said was “not very difficult” because more than half of applicants at the time were accepted, compared to last year’s 7.4 percent rate….
Barry received her undergraduate degree from Mount Holyoke College, a master’s from Columbia University and a law degree from Hofstra University….“Donald is out for Donald, period,” Barry said.
Mary questioned Barry about what Donald had accomplished on his own. “I don’t know,” Barry said….”Yes, he did (file for multiple corporate bankrupcies.) You can’t trust him,” Barry said.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/maryanne-trump-barry-secret-recordings/2020/08/22/30d457f4-e334-11ea-ade1-28daf1a5e919_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-banner-main_trumptapes809pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory-ans
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“I’m talking too freely, but you know. The change of stories. The lack of preparation. The lying.” -Maryanne Trump Barry said of Donald. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/22/us/politics/maryanne-trump-donald.html?ocid=uxbndlbing
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