Toomey discusses opioid crisis, campaign ads
U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey will square off with former state and federal environmental policy official Kathleen McGinty on Tuesday in his bid for a second six-year term in office.
It is one of the most watched races and most expensive as both candidates have received and spent more than $5 million in the recent months leading up to Tuesday’s election, according to the most recent Federal Election Commission campaign finance report.
The two have met face to face twice in televised debates.
Both candidates were invited by the Herald-Standard to participate in a candidate forum with each declining to do so due to their campaign schedule. Toomey, however, agreed to conduct a telephone interview and answer several questions posed by the newspaper’s editorial board.
McGinty declined the invitation to take part in a similar interview, citing her heavy schedule leading up to election day.
Christopher Whitlatch, Mon Valley Alliance chief executive officer, offered the questions to Toomey.
Opioid crisis
It is estimated that more than 2 million people in the U.S. are addicted to opioid pain relievers, and the number of unintentional overdose deaths from those medications have quadrupled since 1999, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
Toomey believes that the federal government has a key role in curbing the abuse.
“I wish there were a silver bullet to make this go away, but obviously there is not,” he said.
Toomey said recent legislation has somewhat safeguarded over-prescribing of opioids by hospitals that were being compensated for pain management.
Reimbursements were formerly based on patient satisfaction surveys that included queries about the total elimination of pain, that could, in some cases, result in over-prescribing a painkiller.
“Although a minor victory, we have reversed that policy,” said Toomey. “We need to encourage the medical community to be far more careful about their prescribing these powerful, addictive opioids.”
Toomey said bipartisan legislation was passed to prevent abuse of Medicaid by Medicare beneficiaries from going to multiple physicians and pharmacies to obtain opioids for personal use or sale on the streets. Toomey said the legislation should reduce black market sales.
Treatment for addicts must also be improved, Toomey said.
“It is a hard process, but it can happen,” he said. “There are many people — post-addiction — that are leading drug-free, successful lives.
“People need to know that and we need to make sure there is growing access to that kind of care.”
Also, said Toomey, the influx of fentynal from China must be halted, as it has become a replacement for heroin because of its potency.
“We need to do more to block fentynal from getting into this country,” he said. “I have urged Secretary of State (John) Kerry to forcefully insist, and use the many tools at our disposal, to pressure China to do a better job to crack down on the fentynal manufacturing in China that ends up in the U.S.
Senatorial race
Advertisements for both McGinty and Toomey have filled the airwaves over the past few months. Each have paid for some of the television, radio, newspaper, and internet promoting themselves or questioning the integrity of their opposition.
Other advertisements have been paid for by political action committees.
Toomey said he favored face-to-face debates with McGinty to allow voters the opportunity to learn of their views on the issues. However, McGinty only agreed to two debates — one in the Pittsburgh area and the second in the Philadelphia area.
“I am absolutely flabbergasted at the sheer scale of the ad pur- chases,” he said. “It is unbelievable.
“I don’t believe competing 30 second ads is the best way to inform voters of the differences between campaigns. That’s why I suggested we have five debates across Pennsylvania so we could get into a more substantive conversation and voters would have a better sense for where we were coming from.”
Of the dozens of ads, either from McGinty or a supporting organization, Toomey said the most egregious is the one that alleged his ownership of a bank that was guilty of predatory lending practices that caused the displacement of 20 homeowners.
The advertisement was paid for by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
“It was so dishonest, broadcasters refused to run it,” said Toomey. “That’s very unusual as broadcasters like to collect the money they can take in by running the ad.
“This was so egregious, so dishonest, they refused to run the ad.”
Toomey co-founded Team Capital Bank in 2005 and sat on its board until 2009 when he was elected to the Senate. He purchased stock in the bank at that time.
In 2013, it was acquired by Provident Bank.
The ad alleged that Toomey later used his senatorial position to aid the banking industry when the votes noted in the ad were tied to the budget produced by U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan.
The ad was evaluated by Politifact with the “facts” portrayed in it deemed untrue, said Toomey.
“In fact, one (of the ad’s facts were referred to by Politifact as a) pants-on-fire lie,” said Toomey.
Listen to the complete audio recording in the online version of this story at www.heraldstandard.com.