Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH0 has been outspoken about his work on the Congressional Addiction, Treatment, and Recovery Caucus and also consistently attacked pharmaceutical companies for profiting from America’s continuing opiate epidemic.
In spite of this campaign trail rhetoric is appears Ryan has now accepted money from a political action committee funded by a notorious distributor of opiates.
AmerisourceBergen PAC made a $1,000 gift in November 2019.
Emails uncovered in 2021 during a lawsuit against the firm for its alleged participation in the opioid crisis revealed officials at AmerisourceBergen expressing widespread scorn for impoverished whites suffering from addiction, which was mostly driven by medications at the time.
A senior AmerisourceBergen executive was caught circulating a parody song that referenced “pillbillies” and “OxyContinville” as a way to mock victims of the opioid crisis.
The contribution might be a political issue for Ryan, a Democrat running in a state that has been particularly hard hit by the drug crisis.
In 2020, Ohio had almost 5,200 overdose fatalities.
The Associated Press has reported that Ryan has received at least 27,000 dollars from a variety of opioid distributors since 2007.
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