{"id":32021,"date":"2025-01-31T01:00:32","date_gmt":"2025-01-31T01:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/31\/top-republican-on-senate-health-committee-says-hes-struggling-to-confirm-rfk-jr\/"},"modified":"2025-01-31T01:00:32","modified_gmt":"2025-01-31T01:00:32","slug":"top-republican-on-senate-health-committee-says-hes-struggling-to-confirm-rfk-jr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/31\/top-republican-on-senate-health-committee-says-hes-struggling-to-confirm-rfk-jr\/","title":{"rendered":"Top Republican on Senate health committee says he&#8217;s &#8216;struggling&#8217; to confirm RFK Jr"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The top Republican on the Senate&#8217;s chief health committee, Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., indicated Thursday during Robert F. Kennedy Jr.&#8217;s second confirmation hearing of the week that his vote for Trump&#8217;s nominee to head Health and Human Services was not a lock, noting that he was &#8220;struggling&#8221; to confirm Kennedy over his inability to admit vaccines are safe and don&#8217;t cause autism.<\/p>\n<p>Kennedy faced two separate hearings in front of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/politics\/senate\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Senate lawmakers<\/a> this week in his bid to be the next secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy was probed frequently over his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/health\/infectious-disease\/vaccines\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">views on vaccines,<\/a> which have been a sticking point for many senators as they figure out whether to vote in favor of Kennedy&#8217;s nomination or not.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/rfk-jr-rips-dem-senator-pushing-dishonest-narrative-past-vaccine-comments\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>RFK JR RIPS DEM SENATOR FOR PUSHING \u2018DISHONEST\u2019 NARRATIVE ON PAST VACCINE COMMENTS: \u2018CORRECTED IT MANY TIMES\u2019<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>During the hearings, Kennedy refused to reject claims he has posited publicly in the past that vaccines cause autism and argued he is not anti-vaccine but rather &#8220;pro-safety.&#8221; Kennedy added during the hearings that his plan as HHS secretary would be to &#8220;follow the science,&#8221; noting that if the science says he is wrong on vaccines, he will publicly apologize.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But senators, like Cassidy, have suggested during Kennedy&#8217;s confirmation hearings that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/science\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the science<\/a> says vaccines are safe \u2014 and they don&#8217;t cause autism.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;My responsibility is to learn, try and determine, if you can be trusted to support the best public health,&#8221; Cassidy, a former physician, said during his closing remarks at Kennedy&#8217;s Thursday confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP). &#8220;A worthy movement called \u2018MAHA,\u2019&#8221; Cassidy continued, &#8220;to improve the health of Americans, or to undermine it, always asking for more evidence, and never accepting the evidence that is there \u2026 That is why I&#8217;ve been struggling with your nomination.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/video\/6367836897112\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>DOCTOR DEFENDS RFK JR&#8217;S VACCINE STANCE: \u2018HE\u2019S NOT AGAINST VACCINES&#8217;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Cassidy repeatedly asked Kennedy during the Thursday hearing to publicly declare that vaccines don&#8217;t cause autism, but he refused. &#8220;That would have an incredible impact,&#8221; Cassidy said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There are issues we are, man, ultra-processed food, obesity, we are simpatico. We are completely aligned,&#8221; Cassidy continued during his closing remarks. &#8220;And as someone who has discussed immunizations with thousands of people, I understand that mothers want reassurance that the vaccine their child is receiving is necessary, safe and effective. We agree on that point, the two of us, but we&#8217;ve approached it differently. And I think I can say that I&#8217;ve approached it using the preponderance of evidence to reassure, and you&#8217;ve approached it using selective evidence to cast doubt.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Cassidy pointed out the massive &#8220;megaphone&#8221; Kennedy has as a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/jfks-daughter-says-cousin-rfk-jr-predator-willfully-misinformed-unqualified-lead-hhs\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">descendant of former President John F. Kennedy,<\/a> and questioned whether he will use his credibility &#8220;to support&#8221; or &#8220;to undermine&#8221; the nation&#8217;s public health and its confidence in vaccines.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I got to figure that out, for my vote,&#8221; Cassidy said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The top Republican on the Senate&#8217;s chief health committee, Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., indicated Thursday during Robert F. Kennedy Jr.&#8217;s second confirmation hearing of the week that his vote for Trump&#8217;s nominee to head Health and Human Services was not a lock, noting that he was &#8220;struggling&#8221; to confirm Kennedy over his inability to admit &#8230; <a title=\"Top Republican on Senate health committee says he&#8217;s &#8216;struggling&#8217; to confirm RFK Jr\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/31\/top-republican-on-senate-health-committee-says-hes-struggling-to-confirm-rfk-jr\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Top Republican on Senate health committee says he&#8217;s &#8216;struggling&#8217; to confirm RFK Jr\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32021\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}