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WASHINGTON – Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-VA), a member of the Senate Finance Committee, today questioned President Trump’s nominee for U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Kennedy’s career has focused on touting disproven claims about vaccines, and he has a rapidly changing record on abortion rights. 

Responding to Kennedy’s statements maligning Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act, Sen. Warner said (0:05):

“Well, I have to tell you, for literally hundreds of thousands of Virginians, Medicaid is what prevents them from health crises on a daily and weekly basis. And some imaginary new plan? If there was a new plan, that was to be the basis of what Trump was going to do on repealing Obamacare… I would have thought by now we'd have seen it.” 

Sen. Warner’s questions also follow an unlawful directive from President Trump on Monday night to freeze trillions in government grants, loans, and programs. While the action was successfully blocked until Feb. 3 by a federal judge, it could still go into effect at that point, directly threatening countless federal benefits, funding for public schools and community health centers, local domestic violence shelters, firefighters and law enforcement, and much more.

Kennedy’s campaign fundraised off this unlawful directive in an email to supporters, celebrating it as a way to “prevent unelected bureaucrats from further undermining our health freedom.” Kennedy’s unsuccessful presidential campaign is $2 million in debt, and the email was an attempt to garner donations from supporters to cover that shortfall. Questioning Kennedy on these decisions, Sen. Warner said (1:20),

“So the fact that you celebrate this freeze, do you think that was a good idea to put all of this on hold for 90 days, NIH funding, and any kind of further work in your research? I'd like you to explain to a domestic violence center in Richmond that's saying, because of this freeze, they may have to close down… where are those battered women going to go? Or to a rural nonprofit I've got in the Shenandoah Valley saying that freeze is going to potentially shut down their ability to operate...”

Sen. Warner also pushed Kennedy on his pledge to remove 2,200 HHS employees, and asked what departments he might be firing people from. He also touched on President Trump’s questionably legal action to offer all federal employees a “buyout” (2:41):

“Now, you've said publicly you want to immediately get rid of 600 workers on job one on day one… When we had our meeting, you said you actually like to get rid of 2,200 people from HHS. Which offices are you going to start cutting and ripping these 2,200 workers from? … When we're looking at this purge and we're looking at laying off workers, when we're looking at potentially the president's illegal offer to try to buy out federal employees, which I would say to any federal employees, think twice… has this individual in his business role ever fulfilled his contracts or obligations to any workers in the past? … But if you are in this position, will you pledge that you will not fire federal employees who work on food safety, work on trying to prevent things like salmonella?”

While Kennedy refused to answer any specific departments he would protect or fire, Sen. Warner pushed him to see if his determinations on worthy departments would be at his discretion or based on President Trump’s ideas. When Kennedy responded that it would be his choice, Sen. Warner answered (5:09),

“So I guess that means a lot of folks who've had any type of views on vaccines will be out of work.”

Sen. Warner went on to question Kennedy about protecting funding for community health centers (5:20) and continue to push him on the federal funding freeze (6:00). His full comments can be watched here.

Kennedy will face additional questioning in front of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) tomorrow, before the Finance Committee eventually votes on his nomination.

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