Capitol Alert
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ASSEMBLY HEALTH COMMITTEE CHAIR SLAMS TRUMP HHS PICK
Former, and future, Presdent Donald Trump stunned many on Thursday when he announced his pick of anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his choice to succeed California’s own Xavier Becerra as the next head of the Department of Health and Human Services. “For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to Public Health,” Trump said in an official statement announcing his choice. “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!”
The announcement left many politicians and public health officials shook.
Kennedy has spread the false narrative that vaccines cause autism; he and his organization Children’s Health Defense played a role in one of the worst measles outbreaks in recent memory, according to FactCheck.org, when in 2018 Kennedy bombarded American Samoa with vaccine misinformation following the accidental deaths of two infants, leading to an outbreak that led to more than 5,700 people getting sick and 83 deaths, mostly small children.
Politicians, mostly Democratic, across the nation condemned the selection, including California Assemblywoman Mia Bonta, D-Alameda, who chairs the Assembly Health Committee.
In a statement, Bonta — who is married to California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who will likely be challenging Trump’s policies in court — said that “Americans cannot afford for the incoming president to play games with their healthcare or treat the well-being of our citizens like a partisan game.”
She acknowledged, and said she shared, Kennedy’s goals of combating chronic disease, addressing toxic pollution and supporting access to safe food.
But, she added “Mr. Kennedy lacks the medical or public health background needed to lead the Department of Health and Human Services. Americans deserve better than someone who has only made a name for himself by spreading conspiracy theories and pushing back against some of humanity’s greatest public health achievements,” Bonta said.
As chair of the Assembly Health Committee, Bonta pledged to use her position to “ensure that our state will continue to rely on science and data to shape our public health policy.”