i think that we knew going into this election cycle that we were going to need to be very muscular in terms. legal effort and with your leadership, mandy's leadership and the rest of the team, i would say mission accomplished. thank you, john: we will now move onto committee reports beginning with the resolutions committee. i'd like to ask mark carr and the committee chair for a report. thank you, mr. chairman. first of all, i appreciate you allowing me the opportunity to serve as chair of this resolutions committee. i've been in the midwest region with richard porter and i helped as well as richard did on behalf of the rnc. and the rules. republican party and the standings on the rules met yesterday and mr. chairman, sponsored for those to withdraw their commissions and therefore the committee does not have any resolutions to report out today. >> thank you, mark.

i would like to now recognize christine, national from pennsylvania, and for the purposes of the budget committee report. >> the budget committee met yesterday and reviewed all of our activities for the past cycle. we delivered on our transparency. we had two additional committees that we created over this cycle that would be the audit subcommittee and the compensation and benefits subcommittee. we're extremely proud of the job we've done. yesterday we adopted a place holder budget. we will be developing a budget this spring after the newly elected chairman is able to staff-- >> we're going to break away from this program to take you will i have to the capitol where senate democrats are speaking ahead of the confirmation hearing for health and human services nominee, robert f. kennedy, jr., you're watching live coverage on c-span2.

# # in every media out of the spokes people's mouths since he's been nominated. he's going to try to gas light enough republican senators about his views to get -- to get confirmed. that's what he's going to do. we know that. we've seen it. fox news reported it today. he's going to come in here and just say i'm not anti-vaccine. despite the fact that he said there's no vaccine that's ever been safe and effective. the fact that he said vaccines do more harm than good. he's called into question the measles vaccine, the covid vaccine, the polio vaccine. it's more than vaccines, he doesn't believe in infectious disease research, he wants to stop it, cut nih. he wants to cut the f.d.a. he doesn't believe in public health. he doesn't believe in the

science behind public health. he's a conspiracy theorist. he's a misinformation artist. he's a grifter and today he'll be a gaslighter, but i want to give you one statistic from "the washington post" story yesterday. he's going to appear before the finance committee today and the health committee tomorrow and so two appearances he's going to gaslight the american people and try to gaslight enough republican senators to get confirmed. but "the washington post" sounded just in recent years, he appeared 114 times in interviews and podcasts and other public appearances, 114 times he appeared spreading vaccine disinformation, saying that vaccines are dangerous. saying that they are riskier than what they do to help, that more people die from them than are saved, 36 times specifically he appeared in

recent years saying that childhood vaccines lead to autism, which is-- has been disproven, debunked and it's conspiracy theory that only a grifter who founded his own anti-vaccine group to enrich himself, that only a grifter would do to prey on parents. i want to thank people for coming. some people came from quite a long way, governor and dr. green, but with that i want to turn it over to the great senator, someone who has really been an advocate against this nomination, who has been a fighter, who's been to the floor, who's helped lead and whip, and i think because of what senator and others have done we are going to defeat this nomination and we are going to stop rfk. with that we'll turn it over. [applause]. >> thank you. good morning and i want to

welcome our governor and thank him for coming. you know, my dad was a professor of medicine, public health doctor, that's how we ended up in the state of hawaii when i was 2 years old. he was working in michigan and offered a job at university of hawaii and rounded us all up and that was how i ended up in honolulu, but the most important thing i want you to know about my dad is that when he read in a medical journal about the tuskegee experiments, he was the first and unfortunately only doctor on the record calling out the united states public health service for withholding life saving aid in order to, quote, observe the disease process. and i was like in my late 20's when i found out that my dad had done this. and he was being honored by the

mayo clinic and subsequent to the reporting on the tuskegee experiments, the united states senate led by tom harkin, a real leader on public health for a very, very long time from iowa, ban those kinds of practices. and so, i filed that away under i'm proud of my father and i'm glad this country put that dark chapter behind us. and everybody knows the story of what happened in-- and dr. green i'm sure will elucidate some of it today. last friday there was additional reporting that indicated that rfk, jr. wants to conduct the tuskegee experiments on all of us. he wants to observe the disease process population-wide. he believes that the f.d.a. process for determining the efficacy of medicine does not

reach statistical significance and the only way to figure out if it works or not is to administer placebos to half of the population and just see what happens. and it was last friday-- i was already against this nomination, i don't want to act like i was undecided, but last friday when i heard that he did that, i got a chill up and down my spine and every time i recount it to you i still get a chill up and down my spine to think it's more than 50 years later and we are still fighting this fight. and so, i want to thank all of you for being a part of this. i do think we have a chance. it's very unclear what will happen next in terms of republican votes, but i believe, i believe, don't know-- i believe the democrats will be united and i think we can defeat this nomination, not for partisan reasons not because i particularly want to poke the president in the eye on this

one, but because i truly believe that if he runs hhs that millions will die and without further ado, i want to welcome my good friend, am i introducing the governor? yes. >> because she's also my good friend. my good friend and someone who cares about public health in his bones, dr. josh green. [applause] woo, woo! >> aloha. so thank you, senator. he's dear to me, he's a great senator and i so appreciate brian sharing exactly what his family did to stand up, his father, to stand up against this kind of experimentation on good americans. it's absolutely incredible that the nominee for hhs secretary, perhaps the most important

department that we have because it cares for all of our people, every one of us, irrespective of what party we're in, what our ideologies are, our children need health care, our parents need health care, so, it's incredible that he had that experience and was able to share it with us. let me be very direct because many things have already been said about this nominee. rfk, jr. is absolutely the most dangerous nominee to run hhs in our history, absolutely the most dangerous person. this is me speaking as a physician. i came to hawaii in 2000 with hhs, as a national health service corps scholar, as a doctor, to work in the rural parts of hawaii. i worked as a physician all the way up until i was elected governor, and that went through the period of lt. governor and state rep and state governor with senator schatz back in the day. this nominee spent years undermining public confidence

in vaccines. he spreads misinformation and he profits from it. unconscionable, immoral to do those things, but i want to tell you, what i experienced personally actually experienced as a physician, vis-a-vis this nominee. five years ago, not a long time ago, five years ago there was a terrible outbreak of measles in samoa. why was there an outbreak? because vaccinations had plummeted. i read about the crisis in the newspapers and called the minister of health and their prime minister and they invited us to come over with the medical mission team of about 75 doctors and nurses to come over and correct what had been a tragic circumstance. by the time we got there dozens of people had already died of the measles. why did this happen? this happened because rfk, jr. took advantage with his organization, the children's

health defense, he took advantage of that country. there had been a tragic loss of life of two individuals from a human error and then he swooped in and scared them. scared that nation from vaccinating. the vaccination rates plummeted down to 31% and measles spread like wildfire. by the time my team got there there were these deaths that i described, hospitals were filled with people, people stacked on top of one another in the hospital wards. as we went into villages to vaccinate 37,000 people over the course of two days, as we went into these villages, i'll paint one picture for you, myself, my pediatrician colleagues and nurses we walked into the village and a beautiful young girl was laying on a bed in one of the villages in a home, a small home, we put

our hands on her. she was still warm, she still warm from the fever that had killed her. the measles and the fever that just killed her. you could still feel the heat radiating off of her body, but when i put my stethoscope on her heart, there was no heartbeat. when i listened for her lung sounds, no breathing, she just died, but still warm and then we mourned the loss of this beautiful girl who died because rfk, jr. and his organization scared that family and many thousands of people from being vaccinated. we moved on from her, we had a memorial service and then we vaccinated the rest of her family and their village. if he becomes health and human services secretary, he will oversee the entirety of our national program to vaccinate children and though he will lie today and tell people he maybe supports vaccinations, but he

supports science, too, what he will do is he will cast doubt on the vaccination program, as he has done for years, as he's done on television, as he has done in documentaries, as he has done in person. and it only takes a little delta, another 10 or 15% of people to not get vaccinated to cause outbreaks and we'll see that in louisiana, we'll see that in utah, in vermont, we will see that across america. this is just one reason that he will be deadly for our country and it is, again, not partisan. this is a person who has been a democratic candidate for president in the last six months, but he is dangerous beyond any, any expectation. so, i humbly ask the republicans and democrats, every one of them, to vote against this nominee. he will harm children. he will put children in harm's way, the way he did in snowa, the way he is capable of doing all across our country.

so, i'd humbly ask the president to withdraw this nomination. mr. kennedy can serve in other capacities, i'm sure, but he cannot be allowed to put our children in harm's way. i won't allow it. we have to stand up to this particular nomination and vote no. thank you all for being here today. [applause] >> thank you so much. thank you, doctor, and governor green. dr. green is going into the hearing room today if you get behind him, remember, rabbit ears, but thank you so much. i'll just say the samoa story is the synopsis, the best example how dangerous rfk, jr. is so i want to thank you so much for being here. next i want to introduce a great senator, someone who is extremely important to protect our care because we've done a lot of work with you here and in wisconsin and there's no better champion of health care in the united states senate than tammy baldwin.

senator tammy baldwin. [applause] >> thank you, and i also want to express my appreciation to governor green, but particularly dr. green in this particular case for making your way here to share this critical story that people need to know. as some of you may know, i got into politics in the first place because of my own health care journey. when i was 9 years old, i had a serious childhood illness similar to spinal meningitis which landed me in the hospital for three months. i carry this experience with me each and every day and it still informs how i think about keeping wisconsinites safe and healthy and it informs how i approach health policy to this very day. when i was looking at rfk, jr.'s nomination, i did it to

the same lens of every other nominee. will they help or harm my constituents? and let me walk through my thinking on this one. the department of health and human services is responsible for keeping our nation healthy. charged with overseeing vaccines to stop the spread of diseases like polio and measles. spearheading lifesaving research into cures for cancer, diabetes, alzheimer's, and much more. at the core of all of this work is, of course, science. the head of the hhs must believe in science to keep people healthy and believe the experts, not conspiracy theories. robert f. kennedy, jr. does not meet that very simple requirement. it's not just that he doesn't believe in science and trust

our experts, he actively undermines them. rfk, jr. is one of the top spreaders of misinformation about vaccines peddling bogus conspiracy theories that these safe and effective protections for americans are somehow harmful. in fact, he said once that novak -- no vaccine is safe and effective. i'll bet the tens of millions of people who have not come down with polio, measles or mumps and many other diseases because of vaccines would beg to differ. but his dangerous theories do not stop at vaccines. he settled claims that wi-fi causes cancer. he's called lifesaving research into hiv and aids phony and

blames school shootings on anti-depressants. these theories may sound preposterous, but when we're talking about the leading health official in our country, they undercut the hard work of scientists and doctors who have dedicated their lives to keeping americans safe and well. he's also threatened to downsize the national institute of health, which works every day to find life saving breakthrough treatments and cures for cancer, alzheimer's, and diabetes, as well as so many other illnesses that impact millions of american families. take it from me, somebody who spent months in a hospital bed as a child. i know the consequences of not protecting our kids from serious illness. i know the toll it takes on a

family, both emotionally and financially. i also know what it's like to have science-backed medicine and great health care. americans deserve a leading health official who believes in science, not conspiracies, and i urge my colleagues to ask themselves the simple question, will this nominee keep your constituents safe? or hurt them. for robert f. kennedy, jr., i think that the answer is clear and i urge my colleagues, all of them on behalf of families in their states to oppose his nomination. [applause] >> all right. thank you. thank you senator baldwin and thank you for always advocating for health care and for public health. now introduce somebody who gave me a lifter in this campaign. it's hard to count votes before holding stuff close to their

vest and at one point we had few democrats that came out and then i went online and i saw senator chris murphy laying the wood to this nomination. that's what he's going to do now. senator chris murphy. [applause] >> raising expectations, that's the worst thing you could do at a press conference. listen, there are very few people in the united states of america who are less qualified to lead the department of health and human services than robert f. kennedy, jr. you can literally walk down the street and the first 100 people you'd find would be less dangerous at the head of hhs than robert f. kennedy, jr. why? not just because he is overtly hostile to vaccines. i met with him for a half hour, it was a stunning half an hour in which he told me to my face

he's not anti-vaccines. and so i read to him the litany of things he has said, like there's no safe vaccine and then all of the individual things he said about individual vaccines and how unsafe they are. robert f. kennedy, jr. to say he's not anti-vaccine, he's just pro science, is kind of like a pyro maniac i'm not an arsonist, i just set fire to buildings every day, right? he will get people killed. he will get people killed. and more than that, what he has shown is that he is just wildly open to believing any medical conspiracy theory that is put in front of him. tammy told you and others

probably told you, some of the ideas that he has that he defended to me in my office. the idea that guns don't have much to do with school shootings, it's really about kids getting treated for mental illness, and get treatment, he defended that to me. he believes there are chemicals in our water that turn kids gay, he defended that idea to me in our meeting. you do not want a secretary of hhs who is going to believe on a daily basis whatever new medical conspiracy theory is popular on the internet. that's the last person you want in charge of this nation's health care. now, listen, i think the drug companies make way too much money, but i don't want to stop krug discovery in this country. what did rfk, jr. say?

he said if he goes to head up the department of health ap human services, he's going to tell the f.d.a. to take a break on drug development and drug discovery for eight years. right? those breakthroughs save lives. they cure diseases and the idea that you're going to of somebody in hhs who is hostile rit large to the f.d.a. is an abomination. and finally, don't believe for one second that he's going to stand up to donald trump on anything. donald trump's made it 100% clear that his goal is to pass a massive tax cut for billionaires and corporations, by the way, bobby kennedy, jr. is one of those really rich people who will benefit from that tax cut, and he's going to pay for it by gutting medicare, medicaid, and health care

services for the middle class. if he gets away with that, bobby kennedy will get a nice big tax cut and will have done nothing to stop it. so, it is really important that we raise our voices today, tomorrow, and this week. we have a chance to stop this nomination, right, and there are circumstances where if you stop one trump nominee, it may be a temporary victory, but trump is just going to nominate somebody as bad or worse. that's virtually impossible when it comes to rfk, jr., right? if you beat rfk, jr., the chances are you'll still get somebody pretty bad, but you won't get somebody who's going to kill as many people as rfk, jr. will. so thank you for being here, thanks protect our care for everything you do and sound the

alarm. >> thank you, senator murphy, as expected he laid the wood to this nomination. so our next speaker knows a little bit about health care, knows a little about the research that goes into infectious diseases and knows a little bit about what nih, c.d.c. and other health care research does for the american people, the cures that it finds, the vaccines that it creates, he represents a lot of those people. the great senator from the state of maryland, chris van hollen. >> well, thank you. i just want to thank by -- start by thanking you, who care about the people in our country now to raise the alarm about how rfk, jr., if he ever got close to being the secretary of hhs would put the american public at risk. and as you've heard and as you

know, people will die. now i represent the great state of maryland, which is home to the national institutes of health. it's home to the f.d.a. it's home to other federal health agencies and we knew that public health in america and medical research in america was off to a rookie rocky start when in the earliest days of the trump administration, they essentially put a freeze on all communications coming out of hhs. in other words, public health warnings, trying to make sure that people were educated and informed about health threats, they put a stop to all of that. so senator, my new partner in the senate, congressman raskin and i had written to the administration to say stop putting people's health care at risk and restore communications.

but i think as all of you know, there's essentially a gag order internally there's a huge fear throughout these federal agencies about just continuing their ongoing work to help the american people, and that's before -- that's even before we have the hearings on rfk, jr. he has said that he would walk into nih and immediately toss 600 people out and bring 600 of his people in. that will put the nil and american health care at great risk. and we know, and as senator murphy and others have already said, all of you know, his position on vaccinations will result in killing people. it's killed people in samoa. it will kill people in the united states. i want to read a quote here from somebody who spoke to the

country almost over 60 years ago. here is the quote. i hope that the renewed drive to provide vaccination for all americans and particularly those who are young will have the wholehearted support of every parent in america. that was john f. kennedy calling upon parents throughout the country to make sure their kids get vaccinated to protect them from polio and other diseases. his nephew did not get the message. in fact, he's doing the opposite, which is why as we gather here we say that rfk, jr. is not only unqualified, he's clearly not qualified, but it's worse than that because he would pose a danger to the american public. so, when senator murphy says you can go down the street the first 100 people you find would be equally qualified, he's right. but they're not equally

dangerous to the public health and that's what we have right now in rfk. now, i think all of you probably saw the letter from caroline kennedy the other day. she pointed out, and i quote, that her cousin bobby, rfk, jr., quote, vaccinates his own children while building a following by hypocritically discouraging other parents from vaccinating theirs, unquote. i don't know if he just doesn't believe in vaccinations or whether he's doing it as his cousin caroline kennedy said, as a schtick to make a lot of money. either way, it is a danger to the country and we need to make sure that we stop this nomination. i think we can. i think in talking to some of my republican colleagues there are grave concerns about what him being secretary of hhs

would mean to the public health and medical research in this country. but we need to do everything we can to make sure that they hear that message and that's why your being here today is so important. so, let's keep at it. let's raise the alarms and let's protect the united states of america from the crazy conspiracy theories of rfk, jr., which will result in killing americans. thank you all for being part of this effort. [applause] >> thank you. thank you so much, really appreciate it. thank you, senator van hollen. i think it's important to note what he said. i mean, rfk, jr. has to be defeated. he's dangerous. he'll kill people. he killed people in samoa, but we're going to have a fight on our hands either way. so we've got a great panel of senators all of which are going to leave now and lobby their public colleagues to vote

against rfk, jr. we have some great advocates, scientists, doctors. with that i want to introduce peter laurie, director for public science. [applause]. . >> thank you and good morning, i'm a physician and i'm a former associate commissioner at the food and drug administration and now the head of the center for science for public interest and we're a group that works mostly on food and so a lot of people come up to me and they say, well, rfk's got a lot of good things to say about food. you're the guy who got red 3 out of the food supply, right? aren't you with rfk? no i'm not. he doesn't show even the remotist understanding of how food additives come onto the market. he doesn't show any understanding of what it is that keeps america safe. heck, when it comes to food, senator schatz understated the

problem he said he's going to send us back 50 years. no, no, no, it's more like 100. and rather send us back to when milk was not pasturized and there were no vaccinations and children were dying and adults and that's the greatest advances in public health in the last 100 years are the very things that he wishes to turn his back on. what's more, even if he comes up with a good idea, on food once in a while, he's only right in the sense that a stopped clock is right twice a day. because the things that he's advocating for, they won't even happen under the current administration. do you really think that the current administration is going to stand for a pro regulatory approach to taking food additives that are dangerous off the market? do you really think that the food industry, which overwhelmingly donated money to the republicans in the last

election is-- that that food industry is going to stand for an attack on ultra processed foods or on the food additives that allow them to make enormous profit? his bad ideas may happen, but the occasional good one will not. now, we heard the senators say that you could find-- you could find a bunch of people walking down the streets in this town who would be less dangerous to the american people than rfk. and i think that's true. i'm a science guy so i'm going to try a test. let's see if you can get this right. let me ask you this. does hiv cause aids? yes, it does. do germs cause infectious disease? they do. do vaccines cause autism? >> no. >> no. does ivermectin treat covid? >> no. >> do the dietary supplements that he is selling making a

buck off, have they been shown to be safe and effective by the f.d.a.? >> no. >> you all passed the test, five out of five. and rfk, jr. gets a zero. that's why his appointment, his nomination, needs to be turned down. thank you. >> all right, thank you, peter. all right. next i want to introduce someone with a group that few groups in the country do more to protect our democracy and help the american people than public citizensment i want to introduce robert wiseman, co-founder of public citizens. as. >> as we've heard today. robert f. kennedy, jr. is a clear and present danger to american public health. he shouldn't be allowed within 500 feet of the department of health and human services let alone be put in charge of it. he's a conspiracies and an anti-science crusader.

he plays fast and loose with the truth, that's core to what he is and what he does. so when he says i'm not anti-vaccine, there's no reason to believe him, just look at what he said. when he says i won't come after your vaccines, no reason to believe him. but worse, not only is he going to try to do that by spreading disbelief in science and conspiracy theories, even if he takes no regulatory measures at all, he's going to underline public commitment to vaccination. robert f. kennedy secretary will undermine our core public health institutions and undermine public belief in public health. people will die in this country and many, many more will die overseas if he is made secretary of health and human services. robert kennedy talks a big game on big pharma, big game on big

pharma. there's no organizations that's more critical of big pharma than public citizen. so i wanted to clarify what i think is means when he is critical of big pharma. when we talk about big pharma monopolies, we mean that prices need to be lowered so people can get access to essential medicine. when we talk about big pharma having too much influence at the f.d.a., we mean standards need to be uplifted and pharma influence downgraded. when we talk about big pharma not pursuing a proper research agenda, we mean there are neglected diseases that don't turn a profit for big pharma and we need more r and d directed there. when robert kennedy says those things, when he says big pharma has got a monopoly, he means they're excluding, which they're not, but luckily our regulations do -- they're excluding from approval unproven treatments. when he says there should be independence at the f.d.a., he

means the f.d.a. should lower its standards, reduce its reliance on science, and let onto the market with f.d.a. stamp of approval, unproven and quack therapy. rfk is not, is not, is not an opponent of big pharma. he is an opponent of science. he is an opponent of public health. there is no u.s. senator who believes he is qualified for this job. there is no u.s. senator who thinks it. and there is no u.s. senator who should vote to approve robert kennedy to be secretary of health and human services. [applause] >> all right, thank you, rob. thank you public citizens. with that i want to introduce someone, scott hamilton kennedy, by the way, no relation, and the only kennedy we want to hear from on capitol hill today, scott is an academy award nominated filmmaker and

director of the shot in the arm documentary. scott. [applause] >> good morning. he did some of my intro for me so thank you very much. i'm a documentary filmmaker with my latest film "shot in the arm" i had an opportunity to research and expose robert kennedy, jr. for what he is, he's a fraud and spreading misinformation and confusion and fear for decades. his disregard for scientific consensus and verifiable truth is very, very dangerous. science and democracy thrive on the free exchange of ideas empirical evidence and accountability. all of which robert kennedy, jr. repeatedly undermines while refusing to subject his own plans to the rigorous scrutiny. with hhs essential work such as public health surveillance, medical research, drug

approval, guidance, this affects everyone on the planet not just the united states. and his character flaws makes him unfit to lead an institution as important as hhs. i'm keep this short i want to thank the speakers here today and protect our care for the courage to commit to public health and an informed democracy. that's what this is about and governor green, i know he's gone now, but i especially want to thank him for the work he did in samoa and ask all the senators to take a look at our samoa sequence in "shot in the arm", you can see it on all of my socials, scott hamilton kennedy and shot in the movie.com and you'll see him squirming and dodging and obfuscating not admitting what he did in samoa. and i'd like to slip in a

question for the senators, so, mr. kennedy you've stated often you're not anti-vax so can you do us a simple favor and name us, plural, hopefully for all the vaccines you're more. if i say i'm not anti-fruit and i can't name a piece of fruit na i like, i think i'm anti-fruit so if he can't name a single vaccines that he says works, that's awful. to put that in context, the world health organization estimates over the past 50 years, the vaccines saved 154 million lives around the world. mr. kennedy we just heard well said, peter, about his hypocrisy on pharma. and he says he is very critical of big pharma medicines, but will he show us his medicine cabinet or a hypocrite? show his receipts to see what he and his family actually buy? i don't think he will. and lastly, he said several times that he would change his mind and admit he was wrong when presented with evidence.

simple question, can you please share one time, ever, that you admitted you were wrong and you changed your mind? robert kennedy, jr. is not just corrupt, he's corrosive and he must not be made head of hhs. thank you very much. >> all right, thank you, scott. [applause] >> i'm telling you everywhere go find this clip of rfk, jr. in this document documentary. no one i've seen has locked looked more uncomfortable that wasn't in court and i wish every senator would see that as well. with that i want to introduce dr. jan crummus like hummus, with doctors for america along with nurses of america and so many advocates have been in the fight with us, since the minute this nomination was announcement r announced. >> thank you very much. we'd like to thank protect our

care for giving us practicing clinicians the ability to speak to the american people. i am a physician and i represent today 27,000 physicians. we represent all specialties in all states people from all levels of training, from doctors in training to people like myself, a clinician with decades of experience. we are nonpartisan. we take no money from industry, we take only the perspective of our patients. we are at the bedside and that's the picture we know and our only agenda is protecting our patients. doctors for america opposes the confirmation of robert kennedy as secretary of health and human services and the strongest of possible terms. we have studied and evaluated both his statements and his actions and we have concluded that his inability to

understand scientific data that is use of a public platform over the period of 20 years to jeopardize public health for his own enrichment is disqualifying for the position that he seeks. we've read his opening statement where he talks about his good intentions and i cannot judge and we cannot judge his intentions, but we have studied the impact of his statements and his actions on health and what it's done to our patients. and what we have seen is a huge drop in vaccination rates. the last school year, 2023 to 2024, 39 states have kindergarteners who had not reached the threshold of vaccination of 95%. what does that mean? that means that the risk for an outbreak is growing by the minute. i was in philadelphia in 1991

during that measles outbreak and i would like to say to senators mccormick and fetterman, the senator from pennsylvania, that we saw children die, children have had encephalitis that's untreatable due to that outbreak. what i'll say to every senator, the change between 1991 and 2024 is that one in every six adults in america is immuno compromised. ne could be immuno compromised because of disease or because of revolutionary treatments that we are using every day and the next measles outbreak is not going to kill just children, it's going to kill mothers, fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers, and i would ask every senator to consider that possibility. we know what kennedy has said about the covid vaccination, that it is a dangerous and the most dangerous vaccine. we, as clinicians who are

practicing and working with people during that time know that vaccines saved three million americans and i would like to note that if the american people followed kennedy's advice those people would no longer be with us. we are particularly concerned about the fact that he denies that hiv is the agent of aids, and again, i'd like to speak to my pennsylvania senators, senator fetterman and senator mccormick, robert gallow at jefferson university hospital was among the first scientist in the world to identify the eat logic agent of aids. do you deny american science and what it has brought us? do you want to identify with the likes of-- who as president of south america, denied that hiv was the agent of aids and it resulted in over 330,000 excess deaths.

we're also very concerned about his ongoing work with gardasil. it has been a long time a dream to have a vaccine against cancer and we have one. the vaccine for human papilloma virus will eradicate 90% of cervical cancer, vulvar cancer, vaginal cancer. i've been at the bedside of patients who suffered through those cancers, would you really confirm as secretary of health and human services someone who's not just trying to get people not to get this vaccine, but is a profiteer in the area of this vaccine, where his website, children's health defense, lures people in the most vulnerable state who don't have the medical knowledge to assess what he's saying, lures them into his realm of vaccine disbelief and he makes money

referring those patients to lit evacuators in a class action suit against this valuable vaccine. we understand that vaccines have side effects, but we also understand that the greater good and the saving of lives is something that we discuss with our patients in an informed way, not to make money and profiteer from their vulnerability. and so i ask every senator to stand with our patients, stand with the health of americans and vote against this confirmation. thank you. >> all right, thank you. thank you so much. [applause] >> with that i want to introduce somebody from a group that is very special to us, has been recently special to us, as been a real partner in this work. 314 action, if you don't know, helps elect scientists, doctors, nurses. yes, scientists right there. people from public health sector to elective office, they

have, of course, supported governor green and they have been a big part of governor and doctors advocacy and produced ads and we jointly released a poll this morning that shows how unpopular rfk, jr.'s position is and how unpopular his positions are. with all of that introduction, i want to introduce the doctor from 314 public action. >> thank you. [applause] >> thank you, everyone. i've got my little helpers here because they didn't have school so here we are, me being a dad. my name is is dr. andre 0strofski. i'm a fundraiser and donor to 314 action to get physicians elects today office, but today i'm not here in that capacity, i'm here as a pediatrician and as a dad. i doctor up the street here at a federally qualified health center as a pediatrician. i spent seven years at

children's medical center and trained up at boston children's hospital and medical center where i was teaching faculty at harvard medical school. i've trained and practiced at some of the best institutions in the world and i've seen the sickest of the sick. some illnesses in children are not preventible. sometimes bad luck just happens and as a parent, i've seen this firsthand, my kids have broken arms and they've had burns on their legs requiring hospitalization, and that health horrible. i felt incredibly guilty even though these are fluke accidents. i know there's no one to blame, but i felt bad that i couldn't protect them. i've also had patients in the hospital for entirely preventible reasons like not being vaccinated. for the parents of those kiddos heavy is the back that carry the guilt. i had a patient a boy one week

prior bouncing around the soccer field and the following week paralyzed from measles and contracted measles developed encephalitis, inflammation of the brain and now is wheelchair bound and needs a feeding tube for the rest of his life because his parents decided not to vaccine him for measles. heavy is the back that carries that guilt. i had another patient that was an adorable little girl, two years old, ended up intensive care unit because of coughing fits, because of her pertussis. the coughing caused her to fracture a rib and poked a hole in her lung. my colleagues in the icu had to cut her chest to insert a tube to reinflate that lung, and that's because the parents decided not to vaccine her against pertussis. heavy is the back that carries the guilt. and a baby boy paralyzed due to

tetanus. he had to be put on a breathing machine and couldn't breathe on his own and suffered brain damage for lack of oxygen and will have learning disabilities the rest of his life because his parents decided not to vaccinate against pertussis. heavy is the back to holds the guilt. they read an article and decide not to vaccinate. the parents are not to blame. i underscore, we as scared parents read pretty much anything and get scared and take action on that. they got bad information from sources they thought they could trust. they got misinformation charlatans like rfk, jr., spreading misinformation about vaccines is well-documented you've heard it all morning and

his back should be crushing from carrying that guilt. there are other republicans who actually have the qualifications to run hhs by the way. if we need a recommendation, i doubt that trump will take this, i'd recommend a colleague and friend, the former republican senate majority leader dr. bill frist. we don't align on policy issues, but he leads with science, a competent leader and he actually cares about human beings, not about enriching himself. i implore you, please do not confirm rfk, jr.'s appointment to hhs secretary. he's the shell of the man that once cared about the environment. he is the shameful smear on the name of a great american family that once honored science and public service. and he is the frail and fading ghost of an unchecked ego that desperately grasps to sensationalism as if it were the life preserver keeping him from drowning into irrelevance.

thank you. >> thank you, doctor. and children. thank you so much. [applause] >> with that, i want to turn it over to a real partner in all of this work, a partner in all the work that we do in health care and numerous other issues, and that is i want to introduce andrea with the center for american progress. [applause] >> hi, good morning, everyone. so we've heard all morning again about how dangerous and unqualified rfk, jr.-- uniquely unqualified rfk, jr. is for the secretary of health and human services. i am a public health professional. i've dedicated my career and my education to public health and trying to protect public health. so what i wanted to remind folks of is a little bit of the history of how we've gotten here as a country. and some of the most incredible public health advances we've experienced as a global society

and as the united states of america. so when we think about what it takes to make americans healthy, right, and we think about the leaps and bounds that we've made to date, there are just a few examples of innovations that don't even feel like major innovations, but as we benefit from them every day, just from day-to-day, every day, that stand out. one is hand washing, right? we've been able to extend lives just by washing hands because we understood that germs were on hands and germs cause disease, right? another, another antibiotics, right, we have medicines that actually help people when they're sick when there's a bacteriaal infection. the third is vaccination, and this is a tool we've had for an a crude way, for hundreds of years. when you think about american innovation and americans' national security, you can look

back to george washington what he did to try to inoculate troop against smallpox so they could actually be a successful army, right? in just my lifetime, i've only about around 40 years, but in just my lifetime we've developed vaccines against chicken pox, gardasil, which is incredible, it gives me chills to think that we actually have a vaccination that can eliminate cervical cancer, this is incredible. additionally, we have medicines that have helped cure hepatitis c, that has helped dramatically slow and limit the ability to spread hiv or contract aids, and it is so deeply personally offensive to me that the person, the best person we could have chosen to potentially lead the department of health and human services, whose job it is to keep americans safe is somebody who doesn't believe in any of those

things, someone who is anti-modern medicine, anti-science, who again would take us back to a time where we would just see what happens, and it is unconscionable to me that the people who would pay the price of making that kind of decision, it's not rfk, jr. and the folks who are sort of at his etch lon, it's kids. it's little kids, it's scared parents, it's american families who are just trying to do right day by day and make the best decisions for them who are having to compete with just the deluge of misinformation that's intentionally designed to scare them so that someone can turn a profit and that's just absolutely unconscionable. so, along with my peers, along with many of you today, i also ask our senators please, please, please, confirm anyone, but rfk, jr. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you, andrea. that wraps up our program. i want to thank everybody,

excuse me, i want to thank everybody for coming, but this is not the end. we're still-- we're not the beginning either, but there's confirmation hearing today. confirmation hearing tomorrow. there's still vote in the finance committee which we're not sure when that's going to come and then a vote on the floor. and there's the wait. if anybody was paying attention to the stories that came out yesterday, "the washington post" story, the wall street journal article, rupert murdoch doesn't want rfk. and three articles yesterday. wall street journal numerous articles and washington post, i think that's a sign we should wrap up, but i want to say this, call your senators, every senator needs to hear from you, democratic, republican, but mostly, mostly, obviously, on the republican side, this is what rfk, jr. did in samoa, don't let him do it at scale. stop rfk.

thank you all very much. [applause]. [inaudible conversations] >> c-span, democracy unfiltered. we're funded by these television companies and more including comcast. >> do you think this is just a community center? no, it's way more thon that. comcast is partner with a thousand community centers to create wi-fi enabled listening so students from low income families get the tools they need. ...