Foulkes Claimed She Was “Angry” at Purdue Pharma, While She Took Their Lobbyists’ Money
GoLocalProv News Team
Foulkes Claimed She Was “Angry” at Purdue Pharma, While She Took Their Lobbyists’ Money
EDITOR’S NOTE: An ongoing investigation by GoLocal starting in 2017 into the opioid crisis and the devastating effect it has had on Rhode Island families, led us to the role Helena Foulkes — the president of CVS — the pharmacy giant that has agreed to pay $4.9 billion for its role and is presently being sued by the U.S. Department of Justice.
In 2022, GoLocal asked Foulkes, then a gubernatorial candidate, about her role and she told us a story. Foulkes is a highly educated and accomplished businesswoman, but the story simply did not compute.
Over the past few months, as we dug into thousands of documents — including SEC records, documents from her family’s Dodd Center, and a range of other public documents — we uncovered the intertwined financial and political relationship between Foulkes and her family with the Sackler family, Purdue Pharma, and one of their top lobbyists. The relationship’s foundation is money and influence.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLASTFoulkes has made statements that were intentionally misleading or meant to deceive by omission.
But the anger was faux.
Meet Steve Kinney. He is a longstanding Purdue Pharma lobbyist, a close confidant of Foulkes’ family, and a repeated donor to Foulkes’ gubernatorial campaign.
Just two months before she pronounced her “anger” at Purdue Pharma — the company that is considered to have been the leading cause of the opioid crisis and the corresponding impacts on families across the country and in Rhode Island — she solicited a $1,000 campaign contribution from Kinney.
And just two months after that interview, she took another $1,000 off him.
He was not a faceless lobbyist unknown to Foulkes.
Foulkes and Kinney have a long history.
Over the years, the number of families impacted by death and addiction has piled up.
“Eight people in a single family made the choices that caused much of the opioid epidemic,” then-Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey and now governor said in 2019. “They hired hundreds of workers to carry out their wishes and they fired those who did not sell enough drugs. They got more patients on opioids, at higher doses, for longer, than ever before. They paid themselves billions of dollars. They are responsible for addiction, overdose and death that damaged millions of lives.”
In a series of articles, GoLocal has explored the close relationship between Foulkes and her family with the Sackler family, owners of Purdue Pharma.
Kinney is a central figure — the Rosetta Stone between Foulkes’ family and the powerful Sackler family.
Kinney has been deeply intertwined with Foulkes’ family and is a major player for Purdue Pharma. Kinney has been a paid lobbyist for Purdue Pharma for years.
For more than a decade, while Foulkes served on and chaired the board of The Dodd Center at the University of Connecticut, Kinney was the vice chair of the board. Other board members were Jonathan Sackler, Vice President of Purdue Pharma, and Jonathan's parents — Raymond and Beverly Sackler — who underwrote the “Raymond and Beverly Distinguished Lecture Series” at the Dodd Center.
The drug money poured into the Dodd Center.
Raymond Sackler was one of the three brothers who created the massive Purdue Pharma empire. He and his wife pumped millions into the Dodd Center and UConn as a whole — a reported $4.5 million.
UConn refused to release the details of the Sacklers' donations.
As the Sacklers pumped money into The Dodd Center to whitewash their reputation and curry favor with the powerful family that had dueling influencers — U.S. Senator Chris Dodd and his niece, Foulkes, who was the emerging star at the largest pharmacy chain in America.
It was two for the price of one.
Kinney has had a 40-year relationship with Foulkes’ family; he has de facto been the political alter ego of Foulkes’s uncle Dodd for decades. Kinney started as a driver for Dodd in 1985, and his career blossomed from there.
“Steve played a pivotal role in Dodd’s last four successful re-election bids and in his presidential campaign. Previously, he served as a member of Dodd’s staff and acted as a liaison to the Connecticut General Assembly,” states Kinney’s own bio.
Kinney and Foulkes refused to respond to questions for this article.
And, as previously reported, when physicians were raising concerns about the spread and devastating effects of opioids as early as the early 2000s, it was becoming clear that the Sackler family's Purdue Pharma was driving a massive marketing effort to push Oxycodone to doctors and potential customers.
While concerns were being raised, Dodd went to bat for Purdue Pharma.
On February 12, 2002, a critical hearing was held by the United States Senate Committee on Health Education, Labor, and Pensions. Dodd was a senior member of the committee — second only to chairman Ted Kennedy.
As public health experts were raising concerns about the spread of opioids and specifically the role of Purdue Pharma's OxyContin, Dodd voiced at the hearing his “high regard” for Purdue Pharma.
“As I said at the outset in my prepared statement, I represent Purdue Pharma, they are constituents of mine, and I know them well and the people who work there. I have been down there on numerous occasions during my service in the Senate. I have a very, very high regard for them and their employees who work very, very hard producing quality products,” said Dodd.
Dodd added, “I think you have identified here that the problem goes far beyond a company. It is easier to identify a company when you are trying to address this but I think the problem is far more pernicious than the product produced by a single company.”
One of the individuals testifying was a small-town physician named Art Van Zee. He raised concerns at that time, now more than two decades ago, about how his county was being ravaged specifically by Purdue Pharma and its lead product, OxyContin.
Dr. Van Zee warned the Committee in his testimony, “Contrary to what is sometimes portrayed in the media as long-term drug addicts switching to the drug du jour, what we have seen for the most part is numerous young people recreationally using OxyContin and then becoming very rapidly addicted. Many of these kids are good kids, good families, with bright, promising futures that are being destroyed in every way by their opioid addiction. Opioids—as derivatives of opium—are the most powerful pain medication—with morphine being most familiar to you. OxyContin addiction is opioid addiction, the same as morphine or heroin addiction and wreaks the same havoc on individuals, families, and communities. It is hard to find a family in Lee County that has not been touched directly or indirectly by this problem of OxyContin abuse. This is a sadly repetitive story for the numerous areas of the country now affected by this from Washington County, Maine to southern Florida.”
Money flowed.
The New York Times reported in July of 2009: Over his decades in Congress, Mr. Dodd has raised more than $550,000 from drug company representatives, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Today, the legal fights to hold the Sacklers and Purdue Pharma accountable continue to rage on.
In January, it was announced that members of the Sackler family, owners of Purdue Pharma, and the company itself have agreed to pay up to $7.4 billion in a new settlement to lawsuits.
That deal has not been completed.
This story was first published 5/1/25 6:40 AM