Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. got into a heated exchange Thursday when Kennedy claimed the ousted Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director, Susan Monarez, lied about why she was fired.
The back and forth took place during a Senate Finance Committee hearing centered on Kennedy’s record in office and the Trump administration’s new vaccine policies. While Kennedy claimed he fired Monarez for not being a “trustworthy person,” the former CDC director penned an Wall Street op-ed, published Thursday, where she explained that she was fired for refusing to approve vaccine recommendations that are not backed by science.
“I’m sorry, but this is not what she has said publicly. She has said …” Warren said during the hearing before Kennedy cut her off.
“Well, I’m not surprised about that,” he responded.
“So you’re saying she’s lying?” Warren asked.
“Yes. Every conversation I had with her, there were witnesses,” Kennedy stated, leaving the room visibly in shock.
That’s when Warren reminded Kennedy of his past and now-contradictory statements praising Monarez as “unimpeachable.”
“Let me get this straight: This is the same person that, less than a month earlier, you stood next to her and described her as ‘unimpeachable’ and you had full confidence in her and that you had full confidence in her scientific credentials. And in a month she became a liar?” Warren, asked, double checking Kennedy’s new assertion
“Yeah, you should ask her what changed,” Kennedy, who went on to remind Warren that she once doubted Monarez’s professional capabilities. “And by the way, a month ago you were voting against her because you thought she was either incompetent, ineligible or unsuited to do the task.”
Warren then explained that her skepticism of Monarez was rooted in her fear that the former CDC director would submit to any and all of Kennedy and Trump’s political agendas, despite how harmful they could be to Americans.
“I voted against her because I was afraid she was going to bend the knee to you and Donald Trump and it looks like she didn’t bend the knee, so you fired her,” Warren explained. “Look, you’re putting America’s babies’ health at risk. America’s seniors health at risk, all American’s health at risk and you should resign.”
On Thursday, Monarez broke down her 29 days serving as CDC director in the WSJ article “Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the CDC and Me,” in which she said she was fired because “I held the line and insisted on rigorous scientific review.”
“Reporters have focused on the Aug. 25 meeting where my boss, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., pressured me to resign or face termination. But that meeting revealed that it wasn’t about one person or my job. It was one of the more public aspects of a deliberate effort to weaken America’s public-health system and vaccine protections,” Monarez wrote. “Those seeking to undermine vaccines use a familiar playbook: discredit research, weaken advisory committees and use manipulated outcomes to unravel protections that generations of families have relied on to keep deadly diseases at bay. Once trusted experts are removed and advisory bodies are stacked, the results are predetermined. That isn’t reform. It is sabotage.”
This all comes after Trump called on pharmaceutical companies to “justify the success” of the COVID vaccine days after the FDA implemented new rules for them. Per NPR, the agency is now only allowing updated shots for those who are at risk for serious complications or health issues due to their age of being 65 or older. On Aug. 27, Trump fired Monarez hours after she refused to resign from her position.
A day after Kennedy penned an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal titled “Restoring public trust in the CDC,” more than 1,000 current and former HHS staffers called on Kennedy to resign for “compromising the health of this nation” in a joint letter titled “It’s Time for Robert F. Kennedy to Resign.”
On Thursday, 11 of the 12 Senate Finance Democrats have demanded that Kennedy resign in a statement.
“Robert Kennedy was unfit to serve as the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services before he was on the job, which is why every Democratic member of the Senate Finance Committee opposed his nomination,” the legislators penned. “Robert Kennedy must resign, and if he doesn’t, Trump should fire him before more American families are hurt by his reckless disregard for science and the truth.”
You can watch the full exchange in the clip above.
