WASHINGTON – Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took a step closer to becoming a health and welfare secretary Tuesday after a Senate committee favorably reported his appointment to the floor.

The 14-13 Finance Committee vote does not necessarily guarantee that Kennedy will receive Senate confirmations, but despite decades spreading misinformation about vaccine safety, He shows that there is a chance.

Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, who supported Kennedy on the committee, said he received hundreds of messages personally in a floor speech later Tuesday, saying Kennedy is expected to get a Senate confirmation He expressed strong support from others about the matter and stated that he received disappointment from others in his office.

“Kennedy’s most notable opponent is the frontline pediatricians in child health and must regularly fight misinformation,” Cassidy said. “They realize that if their child was vaccinated, they would no longer be ill.”

Cassidy, who worked as a doctor for decades before becoming a senator, said he ensured that Kennedy and the Trump administration protected the “public health benefits of vaccination.”

“Mr. Kennedy and the administration have promised that he and I will have an unprecedented, close, supportive, working relationship if he is confirmed,” Cassidy said. “We meet and talk multiple times a month.”

Kennedy’s pledge

Cassidy said that if Kennedy and the Trump administration were confirmed, Kennedy committed to:

• Works within current vaccine approvals and safety monitoring systems and does not establish parallel systems.

• Maintain unchanged recommendations from the Disease Control and Prevention Advisory Committee on Vaccination Practices.

• Keep a statement on the CDC website that says the vaccine does not cause autism.

• If HHS wants to make changes to any of the federal vaccine safety surveillance programs, it will provide notification to the Assistance Committee for at least 30 days.

• Allow the Help Committee Chairman to choose a committee or representative of a committee that has been established to verify the safety of the vaccine. and

• If requested, it will appear in front of the Help Committee quarterly.

“If Kennedy is confirmed, I will use the powers of the Senate Committee on HHS’s oversight to a life-saving vaccine without evidence of causality like iron that can be accepted and defended before mainstream science. “We reject any attempt to remove access to the community and the legislature,” Cassidy said. “I will look closely at the efforts to mistakenly soothe the public’s fears about vaccines while confusing mentions of the anecdote.”

Cassidy said that if Kennedy is confirmed as HHS secretary from the full Senate, Kennedy hopes that Cassidy will support the plan for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health.

“We also need to reform institutions such as the FDA and the NIH. As already shown, it is my priority as chairman of the Help Committee. I look forward to his support in achieving this. I’ll do it,” Cassidy said.

“It’s obviously not qualified.”

Democrats raised concerns about how Kennedy’s confirmation would affect the country’s public health system just before the committee voted.

Georgia Democrat Sen. Rafael Warnock said Kennedy was “obviously unqualified for the work he was seeking.”

“We need serious people to the helm of HHS, the agency responsible for about half of all Americans,” Warnock said. “Mr. Kennedy is obsessed with chasing conspiracy theories rather than making sure we are protected, following solutions to reduce health care costs for Georgia’s working families. It looks like.

“The last thing you need is a directant who dabbles in conspiracy theory at HHS.”

“Going to the wild”

North Carolina Republican Sen. Tom Tillis said he believes Kennedy will “become wild” as HHS secretary.

“I hope he’ll be wild and find a way to actually reduce the costs of healthcare,” Tillis said. “Instead of him becoming wild and having the 10 years of discussion we’ve had in the Senate to make Medicaid a job and make Medicaid people healthier, he’s becoming wild and knowing how to do it. I hope that the current situation is not achieved much in a profitable way.

“I hope he will be enthusiastic about food safety debate so that he can actually approve food safety supplies.”

Last updated at 11:48am, February 4, 2025