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Great profit. >> mark? >> scott, did anybody get rich off of this? >> a lot of people got rich. all the way from drug dealers on the streets all the way up to the pharmaceutical companies. this is a $13 billion a year industry. a lot of people were making a lot of money. a lot of people were turning a blind eye to what was happening. >> did they lobby congress to try to keep that branch from doing anything about it? >> of course. the pharmaceutical industry, we found, joe, spent about $106 million lobbying on this bill and other legislation in capitol hill. and it was also written by an indust...

Get the ama or some other body to limit what doctors are free to prescribe in this area if the drug companies can't be blocked, if individuals can't be stopped from buying, can you get doctors stopped from overprescribing? >> that's really where the problem begins, is doctors who are overprescribing and doctors who are selling prescriptions for cash. the problem is that there are so many doctors who are doing that and there are so many pain clinics and pain management clinics doing this, the dea felt like they were playing a game of whack-a-mole. they felt they had to go up footed chain and ma...

Then, as "the washington post" reports in april 2016, at the height of the deadliest drug epidemic in u history, congress effectively stripped the drug enforcement administration of its most potent weapon against large drug companies suspected of spilling prescription narcotics on to the nation's streets. joining us now is "the washington post" scott heiam. who is the whistleblower? who is this whistleblower and what exactly is he alleging? >> good morning, guys. we came across him during the course of an investigation. my partner on this story, lenny bernstein, was trying to get answers to qu...