Kennedy's previous calls for a ban on pharmaceutical advertising have raised concerns among drug manufacturers. If confirmed by the Senate as HHS secretary, Kennedy could potentially leverage the nation's public health agencies to implement his Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) priorities. This has led some industry observers to speculate that Kennedy might attempt to ban direct-to-consumer (DTC) drug advertising. However, any such move by Kennedy would likely face legal challenges from drugmakers on First Amendment grounds and may not receive the backing of Trump and Republican lawmakers, who have so far remained silent on Kennedy's proposal.
According to the Daily Caller, during a Tucker Carlson Live Tour event in Glendale, Arizona, on Oct. 31, Kennedy stated, “One of the things I’m going to advise Donald Trump to do in order to correct the chronic disease epidemic is to ban pharmaceutical advertising on TV.” He further noted that only two countries in the world allow pharmaceutical advertising on the airwaves, New Zealand and the United States, and that the U.S. has the highest disease rate and spends more on drugs than anywhere else in the world.
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MediaRadar's analysis reveals that spending on DTC pharmaceutical advertising in the United States surged to over $7 billion in 2023, with ad buys on weight loss and diabetes drugs exceeding $1 billion for the first time. Intron Health, a UK-based research firm, expressed concern about the potential for the U.S. government to ban DTC advertising of drugs, viewing it as the most immediate threat from Kennedy and the new Trump administration.
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Kennedy's potential influence over the Trump administration's approach to pharmaceutical advertising is significant, given that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) — the primary regulator of the pharmaceutical industry’s advertisements — falls under the HHS. The Biden FDA issued new guidelines on DTC advertising that came into effect on May 20, requiring advertising to state drugs’ side effects and medication risks in a “clear, conspicuous, and neutral manner.” Kennedy called for a review of these guidelines in a Wall Street Journal op-ed published on Sept. 5.
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Kennedy, during his presidential campaign and as a Trump campaign surrogate, argued that media outlets receiving substantial ad revenue from pharmaceutical companies cannot report objectively on Big Pharma. He stated on his website, “The primary purpose of pharmaceutical advertising is not to influence consumers, but rather the television networks and news itself. It gives Big Pharma the power to dictate what goes on the news — and what doesn’t — because the networks won’t bite the hand that feeds them.”
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Kennedy's concerns about mainstream media being manipulated by the pharmaceutical industry to suppress critical reporting on drugmakers in exchange for ad revenue have been echoed by influential voices in the MAHA movement and other Trump allies. Calley Means, a Kennedy advisor and MAHA advocate, told Tucker Carlson during a Feb 2 interview, “The news ad spending from pharma is a public relations lobbying tactic, essentially to buy off the news. The news is not investigating pharma.”
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Elon Musk, in response to a post alleging a correlation between the growth of pharmaceutical advertising and rising media bias, wrote on Nov. 19, “No advertising for pharma.” Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, Trump’s nominee to lead the National Institutes of Health, has also argued that media organizations profiting from pharmaceutical advertising revenue should face increased scrutiny when reporting on public health matters. Bhattacharya, who was notably blacklisted by Twitter before Musk purchased the platform over his criticism of the medical establishment’s lockdown approach to the COVID-19 pandemic, wrote on May 30, 2023, “Because of DTC ads, drug companies like Pfizer hold a vice grip on the editorial policies of conventional American media, which can ill afford to lose the advertising money.”
Dr. Marty Mackary, Trump’s pick to lead the FDA, has not commented on Kennedy’s proposal nor allegations that the mainstream media has been corrupted by the pharmaceutical industry. However, Dr. Jeffrey Singer, a general surgeon and senior fellow at the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute, has argued that Kennedy's calls to ban pharmaceutical advertising infringe upon the First Amendment’s protection of “commercial speech” and the individual right to self-medicate. Singer also contends that banning pharmaceutical advertising would make Americans less informed about the availability of drugs and their side effects, thereby widening the information gap between medical practitioners and patients.
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Kennedy's proposal to ban pharmaceutical advertising is likely to face resistance from Republican lawmakers who traditionally favor a deregulatory approach to the pharmaceutical industry. The current legislative effort to ban DTC pharmaceutical advertising in Congress lacks support from Republican lawmakers. Megyn Kelly, during a Nov. 20 interview with Casey Means, expressed skepticism about whether Kennedy’s MAHA priorities have enough support to be achieved during the next four years.
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The pharmaceutical industry, which has approximately 1800 registered lobbyists in the United States and whose industry PACs have contributed more than $15 million to candidates this year, will likely oppose any attempts to further regulate pharmaceutical advertising. During his first administration, Trump tried to regulate pharmaceutical advertising by requiring DTC ads on television to include the list price for nearly all drugs covered by Medicare and Medicaid. This move was met with a lawsuit from three large drugmakers and a federal judge struck down the regulation before it went into effect, ruling that HHS overstepped its authority to compel drugmakers to include their list prices in advertising.
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As the Trump transition team remains silent on whether the president-elect supports Kennedy’s advocacy to crack down on pharmaceutical advertising, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, a trade association that lobbies on behalf of the pharmaceutical industry, declined to comment on Kennedy’s calls to ban pharmaceutical advertising. A Kennedy spokesperson also did not respond to requests for comment.
