WASHINGTON — A key Republican senator on Thursday said he was struggling with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination by President Donald Trump to run the top U.S. health agency, saying he had reservations about the nominee’s “misleading arguments” on vaccines.
“Your past of undermining confidence in vaccines with unfounded or misleading arguments concerns me,” Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, a physician from Louisiana, told Kennedy.
“I have been struggling with the nomination,” he said at the end of Thursday’s Senate health committee hearing to consider Kennedy to run the massive Department of Health and Human Services.
“Does a 70-year-old man … who spent decades criticizing vaccines and who’s 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?” Cassidy said.
The hearing was the second in two days for Kennedy during which he squared off with Democrats and some Republicans over his past comments on vaccines, abortion and COVID-19 among other topics.
The Finance Committee, which Kennedy appeared before on Wednesday, has not yet said if it will send Kennedy’s nomination to the full Republican-controlled Senate, which has not rejected any of Trump’s nominees so far.
A spokesperson for the Finance Committee said a vote could potentially take place next week, but that one had not yet been scheduled.
Cassidy, who sits on both committees, told Kennedy at the end of Thursday’s hearing that Kennedy would be hearing from him over the weekend, presumably regarding questions he has over the nomination.
Kennedy’s nomination could fail to move to the Senate for consideration if all Democrats on the Finance Committee voted against him and were joined by Cassidy.
During wide-ranging questioning on Thursday, Kennedy spoke more confidently than the day prior, adjusting the characterization of previous statements, and saying he would support the U.S. children’s vaccination schedule, research and development for bird flu, and scientific data on vaccine safety.
Kennedy also said he would address rapidly increasing rates of chronic disease.
“Our country is not going to be destroyed because we get the marginal tax rate wrong. It is going to be destroyed if we get this issue wrong,” he said of chronic diseases. “And I am in a unique position to be able to stop this epidemic.”
He was asked about comments he has made over decades, including that it was “highly likely” that Lyme disease was a military bioweapon. He said he never said that it was definitively created in a biolab.
He would not answer a question from Senator Bernie Sanders about whether he agreed that vaccines do not cause autism. He also said he did not know if the coronavirus vaccine saved millions of lives.
“If you come out unequivocally, ‘vaccines are safe, it does not cause autism’ that would have an incredible impact,” Cassidy said.
Kennedy has said vaccines are linked to autism, and he opposed state and federal restrictions imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic. The causes of autism are unclear, though theories that childhood vaccines cause autism have been widely debunked and are contrary to scientific evidence.
Kennedy, who founded the anti-vaccine group Children’s Health Defense, argued during both hearings that he was not against vaccines. The group has sued in state and federal courts over vaccines.
“News reports and many in the hearing yesterday have claimed that I’m anti-vaccine and anti-industry. Well, I’m neither,” Kennedy said, repeating that his children are vaccinated.
Thursday’s hearing in front of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions is a courtesy hearing with no vote involved. However, Republican Senators Cassidy, Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins sit on the committee, all of whom are seen as potential swing votes against Kennedy.
Supporters of Kennedy wearing “Make America Healthy Again” hats crowded around the committee hearing room on Thursday, while some opposing his confirmation wore “Reject RFK Jr” stickers on their shirts.
‘Catastrophic’ impacts
If confirmed, Kennedy would run HHS, which oversees more than $3 trillion in healthcare spending, including at the Food and Drug Administration and the agency in charge of the Medicare and Medicaid health insurance programs covering nearly half of all Americans.
He said he would follow Trump’s direction on abortion and would hire for his department those who are against abortion rights.
Kennedy also said gender-affirming care for children has “catastrophic” impacts and that children are not equipped to make judgments about receiving such care. He said he would rescind a Biden-era rule that requires medical providers who receive federal funding to offer gender-affirming care.
Kennedy said farmers should be offered an off-ramp from chemically intensive agriculture, and that illness in farm communities is “undoubtedly” related to the use of pesticides. Some farm and food groups have expressed concern about Kennedy’s positions on pesticides and food additives.
Opposition groups have ramped up their efforts to persuade Republican senators to vote against Kennedy. Caroline Kennedy, another member of the storied American political family, on Tuesday urged senators to vote against her cousin’s nomination, calling him a predator with dangerous views on health care.
Kennedy has also faced scrutiny over his ties to Wisner Baum, a law firm specializing in pharmaceutical drug injury cases. He has an arrangement to earn 10% of fees awarded in contingency cases he refers to the firm, according to a letter Kennedy wrote to an HHS ethics official released last week.
If confirmed, Kennedy would retain that financial interest in cases that do not directly impact the U.S. government, the letter said.
If his nomination goes to the full Senate, Kennedy would need the support of at least 50 senators, which would allow Vice President JD Vance to cast another tie-breaking vote to confirm his nomination.
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