WASHINGTON — Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. raised his voice several times during back-to-back congressional hearings Wednesday as Democratic lawmakers pressed him on his past statements about vaccines and his actions as health secretary to reduce funding to vaccine programs.
The hearings with House Appropriations and the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committees were held to discuss next year’s budget for HHS and the mass layoffs Kennedy oversaw at the agency. But the most contentious exchanges came during questions about vaccines.
Amid a number of measles outbreaks across the country, with the largest in West Texas, Kennedy has, on occasion, offered tepid support of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine, but frequently undercuts that message with false claims about harms and a lack of long-term protection.
Kennedy largely maintained his stance Wednesday, telling Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., during the House Appropriations Committee hearing, that he would “probably” vaccinate his children against the measles today, but added, “My opinions about vaccines are irrelevant.”
“I don’t think people should be taking medical advice from me,” Kennedy said.
In the afternoon, during a heated back-and-forth with Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., Kennedy even seemed to suggest that the measles vaccines was unsafe — despite decades of evidence that the shot is safe and effective.
Murphy said that Kennedy had “consistently been undermining the measles vaccine.”
“You told the public that the vaccine wanes very quickly,” Murphy said. “You went on the Dr. Phil Show and said that the measles vaccine was never fully tested for safety. You said there’s fetal debris in the measles vaccine.”
When asked whether he would recommend the measles vaccine, Kennedy said, “I’m going to tell the truth about everything we know and we don’t know about vaccines.”
“I am not going to just tell people everything is safe and effective if I know that there are issues,” Kennedy added. “I need to respect people’s intelligence.” Kennedy’s children are vaccinated — a decision he has previously said he regrets.
In a separate exchange, Kennedy also claimed that only the Covid vaccine has been tested in a placebo-controlled trial.
Committee Chair Bill Cassidy, R-La., who hadn’t been in the room when Kennedy made that assertion, later paused the hearing to correct the health secretary.
“For the record, that’s not true. Rotavirus, measles and HPV vaccines have been [evaluated against a placebo] and some vaccines are tested against previous versions. So just for the record, to set that straight,” Cassidy said.
Measles spreading in the U.S.
The U.S. has had at least 1,023 cases of measles since the beginning of the year, according to NBC News data. Kennedy has pushed unproven remedies to fight the measles outbreak, including a steroid called budesonide, an antibiotic called clarithromycin and cod liver oil, a supplement high in vitamin A.
None are proven treatments for measles, experts say. High doses of vitamin A can cause nausea, vomiting and liver damage, especially in small children.
Public health experts also pushed back on Kennedy’s responses about vaccines.
While Kennedy has no medical training, “the problem is that the top line of his job description is the nation’s chief health strategist,” Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, said during a call with reporters Wednesday. “His job is to give people the best advice that he can.”
“I wonder what it would be like if the transportation secretary refused to answer a question about whether he would fly,” said Dr. Marissa Levine, a professor of public health practice at the University of South Florida said on the same call.
How funding and Medicaid cuts would affect patients
In his opening statements, Kennedy said that the HHS budget will reflect values of “compassion and responsibility” and “move beyond lip service to communities of color.”
And at the start of the Senate hearing Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., agreed with Kennedy’s opening statement that the health care “system is structurally broken.”
Sanders asked if Kennedy and Trump would work with him on lowering the price of prescription drugs.
“If we are serious about that, let’s work together,” Sanders said, adding that the administration would need the help of Congress as Trump’s executive order to lower drug prices would likely be thrown out in court.
However, some lawmakers at both hearings were displeased with Kennedy for appearing unaware of basic details surrounding the HHS layoffs, including which divisions were eliminated and how the job cuts could impact ongoing clinical research.
Sanders said the NIH had taken a $2.7 billion cut, reversing over a decade of investment in medical research.
At one point, Kennedy couldn’t answer a question about cuts to funds for domestic violence survivors, saying he would “go back and check.”
“I’ve been sitting through this hearing all day today, and have noted that you’ve been unable, in most instances, to answer any specific questions relating to your agency,” said Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, D-Md.
When Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., asked about the childhood lead poisoning department that had been fired, Kennedy responded that they didn’t intend to get rid of that agency.
Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., asked how many jobs had been lost at the National Institutes of Health’s Clinical Center after a woman in her state said she faced delays in care for Stage 4 cancer.
Kennedy didn’t know, but later in the hearing said that his team had investigated the woman’s case, and discovered that she was ineligible for medical care through the NIH program.
The proposed HHS budget for fiscal year 2026 is about $93 billion, which is a 26% reduction from the current budget and includes funding cuts across most programs — a fact some lawmakers took issue with following the mass layoffs.
The hearings also come as House Republicans work on portions of a bill that propose making deep cuts to Medicaid and could leave millions of people uninsured.
Kennedy acknowledged that the legislation — as currently written — would cause people to lose their health insurance, following a question from Sanders.
“I can go through the people who will lose it. A million people … there are a million people,” Kennedy said.
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