The AMA's Cigarette PAC.

• Author: SHARFSTEIN, JOSHUA
• Position: American Medical Association supports politicians who are not against tobacco industry

Why does the American Medical Association support pro-tobacco candidates?

During the campaign season that culminated in November's election, those senators who blocked comprehensive tobacco control legislation sponsored by Arizona Republican John McCain were rewarded with thousands of dollars in contributions from cigarette manufacturers--and thousands more from U.S. physicians.

Strange bedfellows, indeed. According to Federal Election Commission records published by the Center for Responsive Politics, the American Medical Association's political action committee (known as "AMPAC") gave over $8,500, on average, to senators facing reelection who helped kill McCain's proposal in June. The defeat of this legislation, which would have increased cigarette taxes and granted the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate tobacco products, effectively ended tobacco control efforts in the 105th Congress.

By comparison, AMPAC gave less than $2,500, on average, to senators up for reelection who had tried to move the McCain bill forward. That's more than a 3:1 ratio in favor of pro-tobacco senators and begs the question: Why does a group that represents 250,000 physicians preferentially fund the supporters of an industry that annually kills 400,000 Americans?

No scientific reversal explains the AMA's backing of tobacco's friends on Capitol Hill. The nation's largest physicians group remains committed, in the words of a recent leader, to "take the war to the tobacco companies in every way that we can." In addition to supporting anti-smoking initiatives, the AMA has called for investors to divest from tobacco stocks and for politicians not to accept money from the tobacco industry. After the Senate vote in June, Dr. Randolph D. Smoak, Jr. of the AMA's Board of Trustees, declared that his organization "deeply regrets the Senate's failure to pass landmark anti-tobacco legislation."

Yet not a month later, AMPAC contributed thousands to help pro-tobacco Senators Kit Bond from Missouri and Sam Brownback from Kansas beat back Democratic challengers. The PAC then went on to give the legal maximum--$10,000--to Ben Nighthorse-Campbell, a Colorado Republican who voted to block the McCain proposal and who faced an anti-tobacco opponent.

In the 1997-98 campaign, AMPAC did not support Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, a Democratic floor leader for tobacco legislation who declared in the Senate that "every day we waste in this Congress on something other than tobacco...