California State Capitol. (Photo: Kevin Sanders for California Globe)
Gov. Newsom’s No-Bid Covid Contract with McKinsey & Co. Continues
CA Attorney General Rob Bonta is part of $573 million settlement with McKinsey & Co.
By Katy Grimes, June 21, 2023 2:45 am
In 2021, the Washington Post published an alarming article about California Governor Gavin Newsom’s no-bid contracts with Blue Shield and McKinsey & Company, how he outsourced much of California’s vaccine rollout during the Covid crisis, and how “private contractors cost taxpayers millions of dollars, while demonstrating few clear results and papering over weaknesses in the country’s public health system.”
These no-bid contracts with private sector companies and non-profits make it impossible for taxpayers and journalists to hold government agencies and politicians accountable because there is no way to uncover exactly what we are receiving because the internal documents of private companies are not subject to the state’s public records laws.
McKinsey & Company was also named as a significant player in the nationwide opioid crisis when in early 2021, 49 State Attorneys General, five territories and the District of Columbia reached settlement with McKinsey, related to the firm’s work for opioid manufacturers. McKinsey was ordered to pay approximately $600 million, which the states would use to address the impact of the opioid epidemic in their communities.
In March 2022, California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced a $6 billion settlement with Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family, estimated to bring approximately $486 million to California to fund opioid addiction treatment and prevention.
The AG’s office gave more detail: “In addition to today’s up-to-$6 billion settlement with Purdue and the Sackler family, the Attorney General’s Office has helped secure up to $32.5 billion in relief nationwide, including a $26 billion settlement with opioid manufacturer Johnson & Johnson and distributors Cardinal, McKesson, and AmerisourceBergen; as well as a $573 million settlement with McKinsey & Company. These settlements will bring up to $2.6 billion to California communities.”
While California continues to have a wicked Fentanyl crisis, the state continues to work with McKinsey & Company, despite their past work with Purdue Pharma: California Health & Human Services, the California DMV and Dept. of Social Services continue to work with McKinsey, according to verified sources.
During the Covid lockdowns, California Governor Gavin Newsom granted McKinsey a no-bid contract to push out vaccines, even though state and local agencies have the budgets and staff for disseminating critical public information.
Curiously, this was going on while Newsom simultaneously fought off his recall election.
WaPo reported in August 2021:
But the $15 million contract with Blue Shield, plus another $13 million for McKinsey, did not deliver on that promise, according to state and county officials, as well as public health experts.”
Despite the state’s settlement with Purdue and McKinsey, local governments said they had their own set of issues to address. In December 2022, 30 locally elected officials from around the state sent a letter (below) to Gov. Newsom and the California Legislature asking the state to cease all contracts with McKinsey & Company:
“We need to make a stand against corporate giants like McKinsey by reviewing and rejecting all contracts with local governments,” they wrote.
Why? The officials said that with more than half a million Americans having died from an opioid overdose, “no family has escaped the pain and suffering that opioids have wrought on our country.”
They continued:
“The opioid epidemic was not a mistake. It was not an accident, or a natural disaster. It was not the result of a bad economy. It didn’t just come out of nowhere. We know now that the opioid crisis was planned. It was branded. It was packaged and sold and marketed.”
“According to New York Attorney General Letitia James, ‘the taproot’ of the opioid crisis in America was a decision by Purdue Pharma to aggressively market their deadly drug Oxycontin despite their full knowledge that their drug was highly addictive, medically questionable, and was killing and addicting scores of Americans. And thanks to the efforts of Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey, we now know that the company that wrote the strategy and profited from Purdue’s deadly drug was a management consulting firm called McKinsey & Company.”
These public officials requested:
1) We are asking the Governor and state legislators to review all contracts involving
McKinsey and review to determine if there are other conflicts of interest.
2) Before a new contract to McKinsey is awarded, demand that McKinsey reveal their
clients and conflicts of interest.
3) Publicly support the local governments rights to file lawsuits to receive justice for
their communities and residents.
Yet McKinsey continues to work with state agencies.
It wasn’t just state and local government impacted: A Law360 article, McKinsey, Plaintiffs Spar Over Picking Opioid Bellwether Tribe, reported, “The White Mountain Apache Tribe, which on Jan. 25 hit McKinsey with a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act suit over the firm’s alleged role in the tribe’s opioid epidemic.”
That’s a RICO lawsuit.
The Globe sent a request to Gov. Newsom’s office asking why, even after AG Rob Bonta’s participation in a massive settlement against the company, the State of California continues to work with McKinsey & Co; what the contracts cover; and if the CHHS contract is still involved in the campaign drive to push out COVID vaccines? We have not received a reply from the governor’s office, but will report when we do.
For more information about McKinsey’s involvement in California’s Covid vaccination push, the opioid crisis and the settlement:
The Washington Post article: Private Consultants Vaccination Drive Outsourced
A New York Times article: Behind the Scenes, McKinsey Guided Companies at the Center of the Opioid Crisis
Another NYT article about the settlement: McKinsey paid a 600 million dollar settlement for their role in the opioid crisis
Letter to Gov State Legislators Re McKinsey Opioids Conflicts of Interest (2)
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November 30, 2020 -
PLEEEEEESE stop complaining about Newsome and embrace him! The indolent stupid propagandized occupiers of Calif not only refused to recall the reprobate, they re-elected the despotic, corrupt commie czar: His job as mandated by DC was to usher in fascism thus enjoy the litany of commandments the comrades impose on the ever faithful minions…
Apparently you are not aware that CORRUPT ELECTIONS are responsible for electing and keeping Gov Newsom (and other sociopathic Dem/Marxist politicians) in office in California. This has allowed them to continue their corruption unfettered and without the consent of the governed. Thus the reason for California’s present condition as a chaotic pit of a hellhole.
As you can see from the above article, these corrupt Dem/Marxist politicians and agencies now routinely —- or maybe I should says ALWAYS —– ignore requests from journalists and other entities for explanations that would inform the public as to WHAT THE HELL they think they are doing and why. Gee, I wonder if maybe this is because they are in the unique position of knowing that their corrupt activities will allow them to maintain their grip on the state, that they will not be held accountable, and thus no response is needed.
If you have a helpful suggestion as to how the residents of California and other corrupt states can achieve a full and thorough clean-out of the septic tank that is our present “leadership,” please share it. Thanks
One small correction – Corrupt SELECTIONS. I doubt we have had anything resembling a free and fair election in this state for 40 years or more.
No kidding, CW. Therefore, just put an “s” in front anytime I used the word “elections” in my response-rant to commenter Bill above. Never mind any time you ever see the word “election” in any article anywhere about California.
Newsom and McKinsey are a perfect match. McKinsey & Company is the epitome of an amoralistic business organization. Profiteering is their only concern. This 100 year old company, first organized in the mid 1920s, has been involved in many, many questionable business ventures over the years; including the off-shoring of American companies to China and the current WEF “global reset”. It turns out that many of our politicians and government employees are or have been McKinsey consultants. I would not be surprised to hear of the company being involved in Ukraine. Here’s a Tucker Carlson interview of a former McKinsey partner regarding China’s labor camps: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qei0aY2vww8.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McKinsey_%26_Company
Thanks for posting this, Raymond, so we can SEE who these characters are.
Gives great insight into what McKinsey & Co. is all about.
As Katy Grimes pointed out, no-bid contracts with private sector companies and non-profits make it impossible for taxpayers and journalists to hold government agencies and politicians accountable because there is no way to uncover exactly what we are receiving because the internal documents of private companies are not subject to the state’s public records laws. What Newsom and legislative Democrats are doing is leftist fascism? There is no oversight when California’s courts and state agencies like the California Department of Justice under California Attorney General Rob Bonta have been weaponized by Democrats? As Showandtell mentioned in his post above, Newsom and his Democrat cronies are in the unique position of knowing that their corrupt activities will allow them to maintain their grip on the state, that they will not be held accountable, and thus no response is needed. Meanwhile California’s Republican party is full of useless RINOs who are impotent? It’s quite the conundrum?
Newsom and his corruption involving no-bid sweetheart contracts with corporations and non-profits needs to stop. But how? Newsom needs to be hauled before a tribunal and be held accountable for his many crimes against humanity that includes locking healthy Californians and small businesses down (while excluding himself and his cronies) during the Covid scamdemic and for mandating experimental mRNA shots that have injured and killed thousands of innocent Californians. He needs to be held accountable!
I worked 47 years in the petroleum industry and at least 4 of the companies that I knew that used McKinsey consulting services are now out of business. In short, if a company has an upper management that has to call in a consulting company like McKinsey, they have the wrong upper management. These guys don’t know anything either, they are just really smart, and impress failing upper managements.