More than 15,000 doctors have signed a letter urging senators to vote against confirming Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for secretary of health and human services.
“The health and well-being of 336 million Americans depend on leadership at HHS that prioritizes science, evidence-based medicine, and strengthening the integrity of our public health system,” the letter reads. “RFK Jr. is not only unqualified to lead this essential agency — he is actively dangerous.”
The letter was posted online by the Committee to Protect Health Care, a physicians advocacy group. Beyond his well-documented anti-vaccine views and advocacy, the letter cites other conspiracy theories Kennedy has actively spread, including baseless claims about a link between school shootings and antidepressants and his promotion of disproven treatments for Covid-19.
“This appointment is a slap in the face to every health care professional who has spent their lives working to protect patients from preventable illness and death,” the letter says.
Kennedy has been meeting with Republican and Democratic senators on Capitol Hill in anticipation of his confirmation hearing, the date for which has not yet been set. Kennedy would need all but three Republican votes if all the Senate’s Democrats vote against his confirmation.
Kennedy did not return a request for comment on the letter. Asked by text about the swell of opposition from doctors and public health organizations to Trump’s intention to nominate Kennedy, Katie Miller, Kennedy’s spokesperson within the Trump transition team, dismissed the backlash as “just another grift” that would “bilk donors” to advocacy groups.
“Robert F Kennedy Jr will be confirmed and those who are spending their time undermining him will have no place and no voice at HHS,” Miller said by text. “Good luck and best wishes to them.”
Politics
The letter and a corresponding campaign urging health care professionals to contact their senators and the American Medical Association are just the latest responses from physicians and public health advocates to Kennedy’s controversial selection.
The liberal nonprofit group Protect Our Care, which advocates to preserve the Affordable Care Act, also launched a campaign this week with a report and digital ads highlighting Kennedy’s 2019 trip to Samoa before a measles outbreak that killed 83 people, most of them children. This week, Hawaii Gov. Josh Green, a physician, wrote in The New York Times that vaccine misinformation spread by Kennedy played a role in Samoa’s outbreak and warned that appointing him at the Department of Health and Human Services would jeopardize public health.
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In November news releases, the health care consumer advocacy group Community Catalyst called Kennedy “wholly unqualified and a dangerous pick,” and the nonprofit progressive consumer rights group Public Citizen said Kennedy would “endanger people’s lives if placed in a position of authority over health.”
Green appeared alongside members of Congress with backgrounds in public health Wednesday at a news conference opposing Kennedy organized by 314 Action, a progressive political action committee dedicated to electing scientists.
Kennedy’s allies and a dedicated PAC, American Values 2024, have framed opposition to his selection as having been orchestrated by pharmaceutical companies to silence him and impede his efforts to make America healthy.
The Committee to Protect Health Care, which is not funded by the pharmaceutical industry or for-profit health corporations, has been active in opposing drug companies in state-level efforts to install prescription drug affordability boards.
“We definitely are no friend of Pharma, and they’re no friend to us,” said the committee’s executive director, Dr. Rob Davidson, a Michigan emergency room physician.
Davidson said he and the thousands of other signers of the letter were motivated by patients.
“Kennedy presents a clear and present danger,” he said.
This story first appeared on NBCNews.com. More from NBC News:
