Robert F Kennedy Jr will take control of America’s vast healthcare apparatus, as the Senate voted on Thursday to confirm the controversial anti-vaccine campaigner’s nomination as health secretary.
The Senate voted 52 to 48, with all Republicans other than the Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell backing the former environmental lawyer who abandoned his independent presidential bid last year to endorse Donald Trump.
The vote installs one of America’s most prominent vaccine skeptics to run its federal health infrastructure, granting oversight of the very agencies – including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration – that he has spent years battling through lawsuits and public campaigns. Kennedy will wield sweeping authority over the nation’s $2tn health system, including drug approvals to Medicare.
His path to the top crystallized after securing backing from the Republican senator Bill Cassidy, a physician who extracted what he called “unprecedented” commitments for collaboration from both Kennedy and the Trump campaign. Key moderate Senate Republicans Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski also fell in line this week.
McConnell, the lone Republican defection, cited his own experience battling childhood polio as a primary reason for his vote against Kennedy.
“I’m a survivor of childhood polio,” McConnell said. “In my lifetime, I’ve watched vaccines save millions of lives from devastating diseases across America and around the world. I will not condone the relitigation of proven cures.”
Democrats – the party historically aligned with the Kennedy family legacy – have, on the other hand, totally disavowed RFK Jr as a nominee based on his lack of subject area expertise.
“Robert F Kennedy Jr is not remotely qualified to become the next secretary of health and human services,” the Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, said on the floor on Wednesday. “In fact, I might go further. Robert F Kennedy Jr might be one of the least qualified people the president could have chosen for the job.”
During the Senate finance committee hearing, the senator Elizabeth Warren had raised alarm over Kennedy’s financial ties to anti-vaccine litigation, including a fee-sharing arrangement with the law firm Wisner Baum that earned him $2.5m over three years – an arrangement he initially planned to maintain while serving as secretary before amending his ethics agreement under pressure.
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Post-confirmation, Warren reiterated her dismay, calling the vote in favor of the incoming secretary of health and human services “a huge mistake”.
“When dangerous diseases resurface and people can’t access lifesaving vaccines, all Americans will suffer,” Warren said in a statement. “And thanks to his serious, unresolved conflicts of interest, RFK Jr’s family could continue getting richer from his anti-vaccine crusade while he’s in office.”
