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Health and Human Services Secretary-designate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. defended his long record of vaccine skepticism — maintaining he did not believe he was wrong to cite links between immunizations and rising childhood rates of autism — in his fiery and final confirmation hearing on Thursday.
Kennedy also fielded questions from members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee about mounting health care costs, high US rates of obesity, his “Make America Healthy Again” movement, Lyme disease as a possible “bioweapon,” fatalities due to COVID-19 vaccines and “conspiracy theories” about 9/11.
“I’m pro-safety; I’m pro-good science. … I believe vaccines have saved millions of lives and play a critical role in health care,” Kennedy told members of the HELP panel, adding that MAHA moms were partnering with him on “one of the most powerful and transcendent movements” to end chronic disease in the US.
But the three-hour tour into the mind of the 71-year-old environmental attorney and recovering anti-vaccine crusader left several Republican and Democratic senators unconvinced he was ready to be the nation’s chief public health advocate at HHS.
“There are many things you and I agree on,” conceded committee chairman Bill Cassidy. “We need to address hyper-processed foods and reduce obesity, which leads to other chronic diseases and shorter lifespans. This will be a priority in the Committee and I look forward to collaborating if you are confirmed.”
“But I do have reservations with your past on vaccines and some other issues,” Cassidy (R-La.) added.
The Louisiana Republican went on to recount how as a doctor, decades before he ran for Congress, one of his patients developed “acute hepatitis B” and had to be flown on a helicopter for an emergency liver transplant.
“An invasive, quarter-of-a-million-dollar surgery — in 2000 — that, even if successful, would leave this young woman with a lifetime of $50,000 per year medical bills,” Cassidy explained. “As I saw her take off, I was so depressed, a $50 vaccine could have prevented this all.”
It would only take one Republican voting against RFK Jr. to tank his confirmation in the committee — and Cassidy was not the only member who raised concerns.
“We can’t be going backwards with our vaccinations,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who was one of three Republicans who voted against confirming Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
“I am asking you on the issue of vaccines specifically to please convey with a level of authority and science … that these are measures that we should be proud of as a country.”
Cassidy, Murkowski and others on the panel throughout the rest of the hearing pressed RFK to acknowledge that his immense social media following and, if confirmed, power as leader of HHS came with an enormous responsibility.
“There are many who trust you more than they trust their own doctor,” Cassidy said. “I have constituents who attribute your messages, in part, for their decision to not vaccinate their children. I’m hearing from them. They want you confirmed.
“Will you reassure mothers — unequivocally and without qualification — that the measles and Hepatitis B vaccines do not cause autism?” he asked during his opening line of questioning.
“If you show me data, I will be the first person to assure the American people that they need to take those vaccines,” RFK told the chairman. “Not only will I do that, but I will apologize for any statements that misled people otherwise.”
“The evidence is there — that’s it — vaccines do not cause autism. Do you agree with that?” pressed committee ranking member Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
“I’m not going to go into HHS with any preordained …” began RFK Jr. before Sanders butted in.
“That is a very troubling response because the studies are there,” the socialist senator declared. “Your job was to have looked at those studies as an applicant for this job.”
The recency of many of his most controversial statements was also too hard for most senators to swallow.
“What made you decide, in the midst of everything going on in this country, in this world, in July 2024, in your own candidacy for the president — that now was the time to say, ‘It’s hard to tell what is conspiracy and what isn’t about 9/11?’” asked Sen. Tim Kaine.
“Senator, the dramatic drop in trust in our government,” the HHS nom responded.
“You go on to say,” Kaine (D-Va.) pointed out, “‘I won’t take sides on 9/11.’”
“My father told me when I was 13 years old, he said, ‘People in authority lie,’” RFK replied. “I haven’t investigated it. The things that I investigate, I take sides on. People are allowed to hold that opinion. I’m not going to tell them they’re crazy for holding that opinion, I’m going to say, ‘What is your evidence?’”
“So you won’t take sides on 9/11?” Kaine said in disbelief. “Wow.”
During the most charged moment of the hearing, Sen. Maggie Hassan fought through tears to share how her 36-year-old son was born with “severe cerebral palsy” and that she “worried” whether her own vaccinations had caused the condition.
“A day does not go by when I don’t think about, what did I do when I was pregnant with him that might have caused the hydrocephalus that has so impacted his life?” Hassan (D-NH) said with great emotion, her voice breaking at times.
“So please do not suggest that anybody in this body of either political party doesn’t want to know what the cause of autism is,” she added, claiming that Kennedy was “relitigating and churning settled science so we can’t go forward and find out what the cause of autism is and treat these kids.”
“You’re not questioning science — you’ve made up your mind,” Sen. Chris Murphy also contended during another exchange on statements the nominee had made about US vaccine mandates being “like Nazi death camps” and analogous to the Catholic Church’s “pedophilia scandal.”
“You’ve spent your entire career undermining America’s vaccine program,” Murphy (D-Conn.) declaimed.
“If you have one in 36 kids who has neurological injuries, and if that is linked that’s something that we should study,” the HHS pick said, before hedging: “It’s not a perfect metaphor, but there’s no metaphor that’s perfect. I am pro-vaccine.”
Between 2020 and 2023, Kennedy as one of the leaders of the anti-vaccine nonprofit Children’s Health Defense had said in podcast interviews that no vaccines were safe and effective and that he wishes he could go back in time and not immunize his own kids.
At other points, he stood by claims that “electromagnetic radiation” from Wi-Fi “changes DNA and there are scientific studies that have linked it to cancer” as well as that HPV vaccines were “dangerous” — pointing to having prevailed in federal courts suing people over both issues.
In a testy exchange with newly elected Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, RFK suggested that there should be different vaccine schedules for black and white Americans.
“What different vaccine schedules would you say I should receive?” asked Alsobrooks (D-Md.), who is black.
“Articles suggest that blacks need fewer antigens,” Kennedy responded.
“This is so dangerous,” she balked.
“It’s science,” Kennedy protested. “This is published peer-reviewed studies.”
Trump’s HHS pick did, however, walk back other statements he had made the day before the Senate Finance Committee in his first confirmation hearing Wednesday.
“I never have said that definitively Lyme disease was created in a biolab,” the Kennedy scion claimed — despite having told Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) in the Finance panel hearing that he “probably did” say it was “highly likely a militarily engineered bioweapon.”
Several Republicans — including the libertarian-leaning Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin — urged their colleagues to approach the vaccine debate with more “nuance,” given how wrong the federal government had been about the efficacy of COVID vaccines.
“We don’t know what causes autism,” cautioned Paul, a doctor whose specialty is ophthalmology. “Science is a dispute — and 10 years from now we could be wrong.”
Mullin also pointed to the growing number of vaccines on the infant and child immunization schedule put out by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, saying that kids were becoming a “pincushion” for at least 72 vaccines before adulthood.
Kennedy appeared more ready to debate his detractors in his second hearing, though often preferred to focus on his campaign to eliminate chronic disease, the fallout from which, he said, was “bankrupting our country” at the high cost of $4.5 trillion.
In other rounds of questioning from Republican senators, he committed to bringing medical supply lines back from China, appointing pro-life officials at HHS and fighting the “national security risk” of obesity.
“No country did as poorly as us” during the COVID-19 pandemic, the HHS nominee noted. “We have the sickest people on earth.”
In his closing remarks, Cassidy still cited concerns about Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation.
“We are about the same age,” he said. “Does a 70-year-old man, 71-year-old man who has spent decades criticizing vaccines and who is financially vested in finding fault with vaccines — can he change his attitudes and approach now that he’ll have the most important position influencing vaccine policy in the United States?
“If you come out unequivocally — ‘vaccines are safe, it does not cause autism’ that would have an incredible impact,” the chairman told the nominee. “That’s your power. So what’s it going to be?”
“I’m a Republican. I represent the amazing state of Louisiana and as a patriotic American, I want President Trump’s policies to succeed in making America and Americans more secure, more prosperous, healthier,” Cassidy continued.
“But if there is someone that is not vaccinated because of policies or attitudes you bring to the department and there is another 18-year-old who dies of a vaccine-preventable disease, helicoptered away, God forbid dies, it’ll be blown up in the press,” he added.
“The greatest tragedy will be her death, but I can also tell you an associated tragedy, will — that will cast a shadow over President Trump’s legacy, which I want to be the absolute best legacy it can be.”
“That’s my dilemma,” Cassidy revealed, “and you may be hearing from me over the weekend.”
If confirmed by a simple majority vote in the Senate — during which only three Republicans could vote against him — RFK will oversee critical federal public health benefit programs such as Medicare and Medicaid as well as research efforts included in the the sprawling $1.7 trillion budget of HHS.
