Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha endorsed Democratic gubernatorial candidate Helena Foulkes on Thursday, arguing that her leadership skills are what the state needs to make more headway against the healthcare crisis and other challenges.
The endorsement did not come as a surprise, since relations have been strained for years between Neronha and Gov. Dan McKee.
Regardless, Neronha said his decision was based on the merits.
“What Rhode Island needs today and into the future is strong, capable leadership,” Neronha said during a news conference at the Cambridge Innovation Center building in Providence. “This is not a state that can afford to keep muddling around over the next four, eight, 10 and 15 years. Rhode Island will always have its economic and other challenges …. But bold new leadership can take us forward and make us better.”
As an example, Neronha pointed to how the state healthcare system lacks sufficient revenue – sparking a shortage of primary care doctors and a lack of dental care for children from poor families – since not enough jobs offer private insurance to employees.
“There’s a way to fix this, and the way to fix this is to get great, strong well-paying jobs from companies that will provide health care to their workers,” he said. “Helena understands that and she’s someone that I know can help solve that one problem and many, many others.”
McKee’s campaign responded by citing a U.S. Justice Department lawsuit alleging that CVS filled unlawful prescriptions during Foulkes’ tenure at the company – and by noting that CVS entered into a six-figure settlement involving similar claims during Neronha’s previous tenure as Rhode Island’s top federal prosecutor.
In a statement, McKee campaign spokeswoman Christina Freundlich said, “Where Helena Foulkes’ leadership has prompted a lawsuit from the Department of Justice and left businesses shuttered and thousands of workers unemployed, Governor McKee is laser-focused on building Rhode Island’s economy, lowering costs for working families, and standing up to Donald Trump’s chaos.”
Asked about McKee’s criticism of Foulkes over opioids, Neronha said cases brought during his time as U.S. attorney focused on the period before she became president at CVS in late 2013.
“I’m comfortable that when Helena got there, she did everything she could to make this horrible situation better,” he said. “The truth is, there are a lot of things DEA could have been doing better. I remember as U.S. attorney really going after DEA for not having a single sworn agent doing opioid cases in the state of Rhode Island while I was still U.S. attorney.”
Foulkes said CVS took a number of actions against the overprescription of opioids during her time as president of the company, including “cutting off over 600 pill-mill doctors who we knew were pumping out prescriptions,” and doing a drug take-back with more than 4,000 stores. She said she and other pharmacy chains urged support on Capitol Hill for reducing the number of legally prescribable pills, from 30 to 10, that could be received by patients after basic surgery.
With Foulkes and McKee entering a more active phase of the campaign, voters will settle the Democratic primary on Sept. 8.
Term limits preclude Neronha from seeking re-election as attorney general. He said he doesn’t think he’s the right fit to become a judge and has not discussed with Foulkes the possibility of serving in her administration if she wins.
Foulkes and Neronha each said they have no concerns about the possibility of House Speaker Joe Shekarchi, one of the state’s most powerful positions, becoming a member of the state Supreme Court following the retirement of Justice Maureen McKenna Goldberg.
