AARP Hearing Center
The call from the White House came in early on the morning of Oct. 28, 2021. The prescription drug reforms to lower prices that AARP had been fighting for were not included in the Build Back Better budget bill’s framework being released that day.
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Within the hour, AARP Chief Executive Officer Jo Ann Jenkins issued a statement saying the organization that represents nearly 38 million older Americans was “outraged” that the drug provisions were being omitted. And AARP vowed that the fight to allow Medicare to negotiate the prices of prescription drugs, to cap out-of-pocket expenses for Part D enrollees and to hold Big Pharma accountable for out-of-control price increases would continue.
AARP wasted no time making good on that promise.
“We agreed that state directors would drop everything and get on this. Calls started going in to the White House and congressional leaders by 10 a.m. We had never responded to something so quickly,” recalls Nancy LeaMond, AARP executive vice president and chief advocacy and engagement officer. Over the next few days more than 400,000 communications from AARP members and activists made it clear to leaders in Washington that taking Medicare prescription drug reform out of the budget package was unacceptable. Members emailed, called, tweeted and posted on Facebook and other social media channels.
“These were real people calling congressmen,” LeaMond says. “These were people who were fed up with paying such high prescription drug costs.”
The pressure worked. Five days later, on Nov. 2, President Biden issued a statement that showed that Medicare negotiation of prescription drugs and the other elements of AARP’s priorities were back in the bill. Less than two weeks after that, on Nov. 15, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the measure. Those same elements are included in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 that President Joe Biden signed into law on Aug. 16.
“This bill will save Medicare hundreds of billions of dollars and give seniors peace of mind knowing there is an annual limit on what they must pay out of pocket for medications,” Jenkins said after the Senate vote.
LeaMond attributes AARP’s success to the association’s staying power and its members and supporters. “Very few organizations can stay at such a fever pitch on an issue for so long a time,” she says. Between 2019 and this summer, AARP spent $60 million on advertising, collected 4.3 million signatures on petitions urging Congress to act, generated 3.6 million emails to lawmakers and flooded congressional offices with hundreds of thousands of phone calls.
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