Newsom strips Walgreens of California contract over abortion, has more in store
https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/newsom-strips-walgreens-of-contract-over-abortion-17827954.php
Also posted to GD.
In a statement, the governor's office announced that it will not renew the $54 million contract between the state and Walgreens that supplies prescription drugs for Californias prison health care system. That contract was slated to renew in May, and Newsom said the state will look at other possible suppliers in the meantime.
California will not stand by as corporations cave to extremists and cut off critical access to reproductive care and freedom, Newsom said. California is on track to be the fourth largest economy in the world and we will leverage our market power to defend the right to choose.
In an interview with Politico, Newsom said the loss of the contract is only the opening salvo; a review of Walgreens' contracts with the state remains ongoing. Walgreens found itself in Newsom's crosshairs when it announced it would not sell mifepristone, an abortion pill, in 21 Republican-led states after those states' attorneys general threatened to sue the company. The governor said the Legislature may need to vote to terminate other contracts.
"We have, we believe, moral authority, but we also have formal authority and will exercise it in partnership with the Legislature, and in the absence of that, through executive action," he told Politico.