A Democratic member of the House is calling for the impeachment of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr, accusing the official of creating “health care chaos” through cuts to research and unfounded claims about vaccines and autism.
“His contempt for science, the constant spreading of conspiracy theories, and his complete disregard for the thousands of research hours spent by America’s top doctors and experts is unprecedented, reckless, and dangerous,” Rep. Haley Stevens of Michigan said in a statement.
Stevens said the articles of impeachment will focus on issues including Trump administration cuts to basic research into issues like childhood cancer and addiction; the White House’s recent, scientifically dubious claim that Tylenol causes autism; the mass firing of a CDC advisory panel; and Kennedy’s skepticism towards vaccines.
The Democrat also accuses the health secretary of lying during his confirmation hearings, where he suggested he would not undermine vaccine recommendations for children, only for the CDC to narrow its recommendations and largely emphasize the importance of seniors getting the jab.
The Michigan rep called for Kennedy to resign earlier this month.
The Independent has contacted the Department of Health and Human Services for comment.
“The Democrats are outraged Republicans had the temerity to win a presidential election, and now they’re throwing the country into chaos threatening impeachment of the president, impeachment of his officials, and a government shutdown,” White House spokesman Kush Desai told The Independent. “Republicans have put forward a clean stopgap government funding bill, and Democrats should stop playing to their far Left radical base, and keep the federal government going forward for all Americans.”
The impeachment effort is unlikely to move forward, given Republican control of both the House and the Senate.
Kennedy’s tenure leading the administration’s health efforts has been politically tumultuous.
Beyond the impeachment effort, the health secretary came in for criticism this month from former CDC Director Susan Monarez, who testified in the Senate last week that Kennedy pushed her out in August because she was “holding the line on scientific integrity” by refusing to rubber-stamp firings and the administration’s preferred changes on childhood vaccine recommendations.
Monarez’s ouster in August prompted four top officials at the CDC to resign.
Earlier this summer, the Trump administration canceled $500 million in vaccine development projects that use mRNA technology, the cutting-edge strategy used to rapidly develop multiple COVID vaccines that the president has previously touted as a signature achievement.
“I only see harm coming,” Demetre Daskalakis, who resigned his position as director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases earlier this month, recently warned. “I may be wrong, but based on what I’m seeing, based on what I’ve heard with the new members of the advisory committee for Immunization Practices, or ACIP. They’re really moving in an ideological direction where they want to see the undoing of vaccination.”
