Cancer initiative launched by Biden spent millions on salaries, nothing on research

The entire Biden regime is little more than a Democratic patronage operation writ large, as evidenced by the fact that Dementia Joe’s administration is comprised largely of Democratic retreads from previous administrations.

That shouldn’t surprise anyone, given that Joe Biden himself is nothing more than a cog in the left-wing machine.

As reported by the New York Post, a cancer initiative launched by Biden in 2017 spent millions of dollars — but on salaries for hacks and operatives, and none on actual cancer research.

The Biden Cancer Initiative, which he founded with his wife, Jill Biden, sought to “develop and drive implementation of solutions to accelerate progress in cancer prevention, detection, diagnosis, research and care and to reduce disparities in cancer outcomes,” a mission statement filed with the Internal Revenue Service said. However, the initiative did not hand out any grants during its first two years, while spending millions on salaries to former Washington, D.C., aides that were hired.

The Post adds:

The charity took in $4,809,619 in contributions in fiscal years 2017 and 2018, and spent $3,070,301 on payroll in those two years. The group’s president, Gregory Simon, raked in $429,850 in fiscal 2018 (July 1, 2018, to June 30, 2019), according to the charity’s most recent federal tax filings.

Simon, a former Pfizer executive and longtime health care lobbyist who headed up the White House’s cancer task force in President Barack Obama’s administration, saw his salary nearly double from the $224,539 he made in fiscal 2017, tax filings show.

Danielle Carnival, former chief of staff for Obama’s cancer initiative, the Cancer Moonshot Task Force, took home $258,207 in 2018.

According to tax filings, the charity also spent more than $56,000 on conferences and nearly $59,400 on travel during that year. The following year, travel expenses ballooned to more than $97,000 while expenditures on conferences soared to nearly $743,000, The Post said.

As for grants awarded, tax records show zero dollars.

“Simon had said the main point of the charity was not to give out grants, and that its goal was to find ways to accelerate treatment for all, regardless of their economic or cultural backgrounds,” The Post reported.

When Biden was still vice president, he directed the Cancer Moonshot Task Force after his son, Beau, died from a brain tumor in 2015. After he began his bid for president, he and Jill Biden stepped away from the ‘initiative,’ which is technically still in operation though the money train has dried up, according to Simon.

“We tried to power through, but it became increasingly difficult to get the traction we needed to complete our mission,” he told The Associated Press in July 2019, according to The Post.

The scandal didn’t end there, however.

The White House announced in February that now-President Biden relaunched the Cancer Moonshot “to end cancer as we know it.”

“Because of recent progress in cancer therapeutics, diagnostics, and patient-driven care, as well as the scientific advances and public health lessons of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s now possible to set ambitious goals: to reduce the death rate from cancer by at least 50 percent over the next 25 years, and improve the experience of people and their families living with and surviving cancer— and, by doing this and more, end cancer as we know it today,” the press release said, which also claimed that the relaunch was “building” on a “quarter-century of bipartisan support.”

“At the White House, then-Vice President Biden brought together a task force and challenged the public and private sectors to join together in making progress. Companies, patient groups, universities, and foundations worked together to forge new partnerships and launch new programs,” it continued.

All the Biden Cancer Initiative really turned out to be was a make-work patronage program for Democratic operatives and insiders. It had nothing to do with “cancer research,” which makes you wonder what the relaunch is really about.

Sources include:

NYPost.com

WhiteHouse.gov