Robert Kennedy backs vaccines, Trump’s agenda in confirmation hearing

Robert Kennedy Jr promised to reverse America’s chronic disease epidemic and rejected accusations that he is against vaccines, during a combative confirmation hearing to become Donald Trump’s health secretary.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., U.S. testifies during his Senate Finance Committee confirmation hearing. Picture: Getty Images via AFP.

Robert Kennedy Jr has promised to reverse the chronic disease epidemic in America and rejected accusations that he is against vaccines, during a combative confirmation hearing to become Donald Trump’s health secretary.

The 71-year-old Kennedy scion and former environmental lawyer hopes to lead a department overseeing more than 80,000 employees and a US$1.7 trillion budget. However in the first of two days of testimony before a Senate committee, he came under withering attack from Democratic senators, over his history of promoting vaccine misinformation and his sudden embrace of anti-abortion policies.

He can only afford to lose backing from three Republicans in the Senate unless some Democrats back him.

Critics argue he is dangerously unqualified, citing his promotion of debunked claims linking childhood vaccines to autism, his suggestion that HIV does not cause AIDS, and accusations that he stoked anti-measles vaccine sentiment in Samoa during a 2019 visit, months before a deadly outbreak.

Mr Kennedy pushed back against the criticism in his opening statement, insisting: “News reports have claimed that I am anti-vaccine and anti-industry – I am neither. I am pro-safety.”

He told the committee: “I support the measles vaccine. I support the polio vaccine. I will do nothing as HHS secretary that makes it difficult or discourages people from getting those vaccines”.

He also used his opening statement to argue that the ongoing public policy debate about who should pay for healthcare in America was inconsequential unless serious actions were taken to reverse the chronic disease epidemic.

Mr Kennedy said he was most passionate about alleviating chronic diseases and that he would otherwise defer to Mr Trump’s orders. He deflected some questions about abortion pills, Medicare drug-price negotiations and Medicaid cuts. And he rebutted claims that he would profit from working against vaccines.

“The only thing I want is good science,” he said.

But he appeared flustered as Democrats took turns confronting him with past statements that contradicted his claims, while also accusing him of hypocrisy over his sudden reversal on abortion.

“I asked Mr Kennedy to reconcile his many anti-vaccine statements with his handful of pro-vaccine statements,” said Democratic Senator Ron Wyden. “Instead, he gave us a word salad and ducked the issue.”

Senators also entered into the record a letter from his cousin Caroline Kennedy, daughter of president John F. Kennedy, calling Kennedy an unqualified conspiracy theorist and a “predator”.

“Bobby is addicted to attention and power. Bobby preys on the desperation of parents of sick children,” wrote Ms Kennedy, the former US Ambassador to Australia.

He found steadier footing when promoting his “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) agenda – a play on Trump’s signature slogan – emphasising the need to combat the nation’s chronic disease crisis through healthier eating and environmental responsibility.

His remarks drew cheers from supporters in attendance, including from a group calling themselves “MAHA Moms.”

“Americans are the sickest people on Earth,” he declared. “Why are we seeing these explosions in diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, neurological diseases, depression – all these things that are related to toxins in the environment?”

Mr Kennedy – a former presidential candidate and rival of Mr Trump – outlined that his initial interest in health was sparked when he began working as an environmental lawyer, working with hunters and fisherman along the Hudson River.

He argued that he learnt very early on in his career that “human health and environmental injuries are intertwined.”

“The same chemicals that kill fish make people sick also,” he said. “Today America’s overall health is in (a) grievous condition.”

He said that 70 per cent of adults and a third of children were overweight or obese. Rates of disease were also on the rise including diabetes, cancer among young people, auto-immune conditions, Alzheimer’s disease, neuro-developmental disorders, asthma, ADHD and depression.

Mr Kennedy said the United States had “worse health than any other developed nation.” This was despite America spending $4.8 trillion last year on health – “almost a fifth of GDP” – with Mr Kennedy saying this amounted to a human tragedy.

“That’s tantamount to a 20 per cent tax on the entire economy,” he said. “No wonder America has trouble competing with countries that pay a third of what we do for health and have better outcomes and a healthier workforce.”

He said that 77 per cent of children could not qualify for military service, and that 66 per cent of children had chronic diseases.

However Mr Kennedy tempered some of his positions to court sceptical Republicans. Although he has long championed greener farming practices, he assured rural-state senators that any policy changes would be made with farmers’ input – and pledged support for Mr Trump’s anti-abortion agenda, including a review of the safety of the long-approved abortion pill mifepristone.

Attacked for retreating from his past support for abortion rights, Mr Kennedy said

he believed every abortion was a tragedy but he didn’t commit to more restrictions on mifepristone.

“President Trump has asked me to study the safety of mifepristone. He has not yet taken a stand on how to regulate it. Whatever he does, I will implement it,” he said.

“I have never seen any major politician flip on that issue quite as quickly as you did when President Trump tapped you to become (health) secretary,” Senator Bernie Sanders said, pointing out that Mr Kennedy had, until recently, been against government limits on abortion.

“One more time for those in the back: Mifepristone is a safe medication,” Democratic Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley added on Threads.

If confirmed, Mr Kennedy said he would make sure tax dollars went towards supporting healthy foods while scrutinising chemical additives in the food supply for Americans.

“We will remove financial conflicts of interest from our agencies,” he said. “We will create an honest, unbiased gold standard science at HHS, accountable to the President, to Congress and to the American people.”

Mr Kennedy said President Trump had promised to restore the American dream and had received a mandate from 77 million people to do just that – “due in part to the embrace and elevation of the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement.”

He pointed to the “MAHA moms” who had turned out to support him, arguing it was one of the most “transcendent and powerful movements I’ve ever seen.”

“I promised President Trump that if confirmed, I will do everything in my power to put the health of Americans back on track,” he said. “I’ve been greatly heartened to discover a deep level of care among members of this committee … I came away from our conversations confident that we can put aside our divisions for the sake of a healthier America.”

He said the nation had been locked in a divisive debate about “who pays.”

“Shifting the burden around between government and corporations and insurers and providers and families is like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic,” he said. “Our country will sink beneath the sea of desperation and debt if you don’t change the course and ask: ‘Why are health care costs so high in the first place?

“The obvious answer is chronic disease. The CDC says 90 per cent of health care spending goes toward managing chronic disease, which hits lower income Americans the hardest.”

Mr Kennedy said that a “healthy person has one thousand dreams” but that a “sick person has only one.”

He said the first and last lines of his first book published in 2014 stated that “I am not anti-vaccine” but said he would not apologise for asking pertinent questions and being intellectually curious and engaged.

“In my advocacy, I have often disturbed the status quo by asking uncomfortable questions. Well, I am not going to apologise for that,” he said.