Super PAC adds $1.2 million to anti-Hugin bid

A super PAC that opposes Bob Hugin’s election to the U.S. Senate will spend an additional $1.2 million on TV and digital ads attacking the GOP candidate’s record as a drug company executive.

This will bring spending by Patients for Affordable Drugs Action on the New Jersey Senate race up to $2.7 million.  The group says their ads will run through election day in a bid to inform New Jerseyans that Hugin exploited cancer patients.

“Patients who  experienced Bob Hugin’s greed first hand are on a mission to ensure New Jersey voters know the truth about Bob Hugin,” said  cancer patient David Mitchell, who took Revlimid, the drug manufactured by Hugin’s company, and watched the price double over the last ten years.  “Bob Hugin is not a hero—he is a greedy pharma CEO who exploited cancer patients struggling for their lives so he could pocket more than $100 million.”

The bi-partisan PAC is associated with Patients for Affordable Drugs, which advocates lower drug prices. It is funded by Action Now Initiative, a group founded by billionaire hedge fund manager John Arnold.

The group alleges that Hugin, the former Celgene CEO, sold a cancer drug that cost less than $1 to make for more than $600, blocked less expensive generic drugs from coming to market after spending millions on lobbyists, doubled the price of the drug, and walked away with more than $100 million.

“None of these facts is in dispute,” said Mitchell. “None have been denied by Hugin, because they are true.”

So far, two other super PACs are playing in the race: Integrity NJ, run by top aides to former Gov. Chris Christie that opposes the re-election of Democrat Bob Menendez; and Leadership Alliance New Jersey, an anti-Hugin group led by attorney Donald Scarinci, a longtime friend of Menendez, and top Democratic strategist Julie Roginsky.