Rattled by McKee Campaign Ads, Helena Foulkes Is Spending Money to Mislead Voters About a Record She Can’t Defend
The McKee campaign’s ad shone a light on Foulkes’ record of raising insulin prices, pushing to gut Medicaid, and publicly promoting the CVS-Aetna merger. Foulkes is on air with her response – but it doesn’t hold up.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The McKee campaign’s first television ad, “Answers,” drew a sharp contrast between Governor McKee’s record of defending Rhode Islander’s healthcare and Helena Foulkes’s record as a healthcare executive who pushed to cut Rhode Island’s Medicaid program, led CVS while it raised the price of insulin, and promoted the harmful CVS-Aetna merger. Now, Foulkes is spending money on a response ad – but her argument falls apart when checked against the facts.
In sharp contrast, Governor McKee has delivered for Rhode Islanders, capping insulin at $40 a month, saving 20,000 families roughly $500 a year on their premiums, and signing a budget that protects Medicaid, SNAP, and hospitals from Donald Trump’s cuts by making the wealthiest pay their fair share.
“Helena Foulkes is spending money to lie about a corporate career she can’t defend – and her own record contradicts nearly every word of it,” said McKee campaign spokesperson Sophie Mestas. “She’s running from a record of fueling and profiting from the opioid epidemic, promoting a CVS merger with a company that kicked nearly 900,000 Americans off their coverage and drove a 21 percent premium spike, and pushing cuts to Rhode Island’s Medicaid program. Voters don’t need to imagine what Foulkes would do to their health care – she’s already shown them. Meanwhile, Governor McKee has expanded access to coverage and protected Rhode Islanders’ health care from Trump’s disastrous funding cuts.”
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FOULKES CLAIMS
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FACTS |
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| “The truth: Helena left CVS 8 months before the Aetna merger and had no involvement in running Aetna.” |
Foulkes was one of the company’s most senior executives when CVS announced its $69 billion merger with Aetna in December 2017. She publicly promoted the deal and took home $4 million that year alone. The same year, Aetna kicked nearly 900,000 people off ACA coverage and helped drive a 21% premium spike. The American Medical Association also opposed the merger, warning it would raise premiums and lower quality of care.
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“Helena cares about people. That’s why she led the charge to take cigarettes off the shelves.”
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Federal prosecutors say that while Foulkes led CVS Pharmacy, the company chose profits over people on opioids, knowingly filling invalid prescriptions and repeatedly refusing to take steps to prevent illegal dispensing to avoid reducing sales or increasing labor costs. CVS dominated Rhode Island’s opioid market, buying 46% of every opioid sold in the state, and accepted $173 million in secret payments from Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, to not restrict the flow of pills. |
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“Now her plan will improve healthcare by increasing Medicaid reimbursements to recruit more doctors and nurses so people can get screenings for conditions like diabetes.”
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Foulkes served on the 2015 “Working Group to Reinvent Medicaid,” which recommended more than $85 million in cuts to the program at a time when more than 30 percent of Rhode Islanders relied on it. These recommendations paved the way for the 2017 removal of 20,000 Rhode Islanders from the Medicaid rolls and a 2018 proposal for an additional $166 million in Medicaid cuts.
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