U.S. Sen. Ed Markey, joined by a cohort of Massachusetts health leaders, declared Tuesday he will vote against confirming Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as the next U.S. Department of Health and Human Services secretary, saying Americans need a leader who can tackle wide-ranging problems such as medical debt, access to care, the opioid epidemic and the mental health crisis.
"These problems demand a trusted, informed, qualified leader. Robert Kennedy Jr. is not that leader," Markey said during a press conference in downtown Boston, held almost two weeks after Trump revealed his HHS pick and set off a wave of alarm nationally among public health officials, who have decried Kennedy's track record of spreading health misinformation and his anti-vaccination rhetoric.
Markey added, "I'm going to vote no on Robert Kennedy Jr.'s confirmation. And I hope that other members of the Senate, Democrats and Republicans alike, will also vote no so that Donald Trump presents someone who, in fact, has the qualifications to run the health care system of our country."
Without explicitly naming the president-elect's additional health care nominees, Markey said he also intends to oppose other selections.
Asked whether enough Senate Republicans would join an effort to block Kennedy's confirmation, Markey predicted that the U.S. Senate hearing process will create an "uproar across the country."
"When it becomes very clear that Robert Kennedy does not reflect the public health sentiments of average Americans, I think that it could very well elicit opposition from individual Republican senators, but that still remains to be seen because the hearings haven't happened yet," Markey said.
Widely described as a vaccine skeptic, Kennedy has insisted he's not anti-vaccine, though he has questioned the safety and efficacy of immunizations, the Associated Press reported.
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Should Kennedy end up leading HHS, he's poised to focus on his "Make America Healthy Again" movement to tackle chronic disease and childhood illness, pursue more studies on vaccines, reassess federal vaccine recommendations, remove fluoride from public drinking water, crack down on food additives, and boost access to raw milk, among other policies, according to The Washington Post.
The Post, in a recent list of Kennedy's false claims, said the nominee has linked vaccines to causing autism, tied antidepressants to mass shootings, suggested AIDS may not be caused by HIV, and called the COVID vaccine the "deadliest vaccine ever made," among other remarks.
Trump, who unveiled his Kennedy selection Nov. 14, wrote on social media that the "industrial food complex" and drug companies have misled Americans for "too long" about public health.
"HHS will play a big role in helping ensure that everybody will be protected from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceutical products, and food additives that have contributed to the overwhelming Health Crisis in this Country," Trump said. "Mr. Kennedy will restore these Agencies to the traditions of Gold Standard Scientific Research, and beacons of Transparency, to end the Chronic Disease epidemic, and to Make America Great and Healthy Again!"
At Markey's press conference, Mavis Nimoh, CEO of Tapestry Health Systems in western Massachusetts, said she's worried about changes to federal funding for family planning and preventive health services.
"As a provider of sexual reproductive health care, we're really, really concerned because there was a movement in the Republican House to either weaken or gut Title X funding," Nimoh, whose organization serves between 6,000 and 8,000 patients, said. "If Title X funding went away, we would seriously be in jeopardy of shutting down our sexual reproductive health clinics."
Oami Amarasingham, deputy director of the Massachusetts Public Health Alliance, called vaccines "one of the greatest achievements of biomedical science and public health." Vaccination campaigns over the last century have "virtually eliminated" diseases that were previously common in the United States, such as diphtheria, polio and smallpox, she said.
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"While we are bracing ourselves for what's to come at the federal level, we're also working overtime to ensure that Massachusetts state and local public health infrastructure is ready for whatever comes," said Amarasingham, who praised the new economic development law for incorporating a policy called SAPHE 2.0.
The boost to public health infrastructure will require the Department of Public Health to establish a set of baseline public health standards and provide adequate resources for boards of health at the local and regional levels. Amarasingham said those policies mean Bay Staters "will be able to access basic public health protections in every region of the state."
Ellen MacInnis of the Massachusetts Nurses Association, which represents more than 25,000 nurses and health care professionals, joined Markey to voice the organization's "strong opposition" to Kennedy.
"As nurses and health care professionals, we have a legal responsibility and an ethical responsibility to protect the public health and speak out in any instance when the lives of our patients and the safety of our communities are placed in jeopardy, which is why we are here today," MacInnis said.
The president-elect has signaled an interest in circumventing the Senate confirmation process by relying on recess appointments, in which Trump could directly fill Cabinet roles while the Senate is in recess. Markey said he will fight Trump "every single step of the way" should Trump use recess appointments, a practice the U.S. Supreme Court restricted in 2014 to limit presidential power, the AP reported.
"I will fight any efforts to adjourn the Senate in any way that does make recess appointments possible," Markey said. "We have to absolutely guarantee that the role that the Senate plays is protected. It was built into the Constitution for a reason, and it is to ensure that no president can act arbitrarily, dictatorially and circumvent the questioning of the Senate."
