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Boston Scientific announced on Sunday that it has chosen to temporarily suspend its political action committee (PAC) activity and “review our approach to future contributions.
“As we shared last week, we believe in respecting the integrity of the democratic process, the election outcome and the peaceful transition of power,” the company said in an email to Medical Design & Outsourcing. “We remain committed to our values — including diversity and caring — in our work to bring meaningful medical innovations to physicians and patients who need them.”
By mid-afternoon today, Medtronic had taken a similar course, according to spokesman Ben Petok.
“The Medtronic PAC is currently reviewing its guidelines for political donations as it develops its contribution plan for the 2022 election cycle,” Petok said in an email. “The PAC Board will make a determination about future donations once that review is completed. While that review is underway and until the new PAC contribution plan is approved, the Medtronic PAC will not make any donations to elected representatives or their leadership PACs.”
Leadership PACS accounted for $10,704,578 in donations to Electoral College objectors, according to OpenSecrets.org. Companies that make pharmaceuticals and health products contributed $4,475,093, the nonprofit political contribution tracking organization noted.
The medtech companies’ political contribution decisions are less focused on individual candidates than those announced by other major corporations, such as Marriott, Blue Cross Blue Shield and Kansas City-based Commerce Bank. Those companies said they’d suspended contributions to members of Congress who opposed recognizing the Electoral College votes. A total of 147 Republican lawmakers, including eight U.S. senators, refused to recognize the Electoral College results in the presidential election.
Boston Scientific previously donated $7,000 to three of the lawmakers who objected — $3,000 to Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas, $3,000 to Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, and $1,000 to Rep. Cynthia Lummis of Texas, according to the website Popular Information. The site also said that 3M had donated $1,000 to Lummis, and that the company will pause “federal and state political expenditures for the first quarter of the year” and reassess its political contribution policies.
