A senior Democratic senator is calling for a criminal investigation into the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, following reporting by the Guardian that indicated he lied during Senate confirmation hearings last year.
Ron Wyden of Oregon said: “RFK’s platform is built on lies and grifts that leave a trail of dead children in their wake. There are consequences for lying to Congress.”
Newly obtained letters contradict testimony
The Guardian’s reporting was based on letters that were obtained – by this news outlet and the Associated Press – following a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
Wyden said in a statement to the Guardian that he would be pressing Republican colleagues, who currently control the Senate, to issue a criminal referral of Kennedy to the Department of Justice for a criminal investigation. “And when Democrats retake the majority in the Senate, RFK will be at the top of the list of Trump officials the finance committee will hold accountable for endangering American families,” he said. Wyden currently serves as the top Democrat on the finance committee.
Also on Thursday, the government watchdog group American Oversight sent a letter to the justice department requesting that it immediately open an investigation into whether Kennedy violated the law by making false statements to Congress.
Calls for resignation grow
Other Democratic officials called for Kennedy to be removed or leave office in the wake of the new reporting.
Wyden was among the senators who asked Kennedy during two confirmation hearings last year about a 2019 trip he took to Samoa, at a time when Kennedy was leading an anti-vaccine group. Months later, a measles outbreak sickened thousands and killed 83 people, mostly children under five.
When asked about the trip by Wyden and Ed Markey, the senator from Massachusetts, Kennedy testified that his visit had “nothing to do with vaccines”. The newly obtained letters contradict that testimony. In one, Kennedy explicitly told the Samoan prime minister he wanted to study the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine in the Pacific island nation and used the words “vaccine” or “vaccination” eight times.
Legal and political implications
“Lying to Congress is a crime, whether or not the witness is under oath,” Josh Chafetz, a professor of law and politics at Georgetown University Law Center, said. “But this would require the executive branch to prosecute, and Trump’s [justice department] is unlikely to do so.”
Still, attorneys with expertise in Senate procedure said that if Democrats win control of the House or Senate in November’s elections, they could use Kennedy’s statements as grounds for hearings or an impeachment inquiry, or to create other obstacles for the Trump administration.
Markey also weighed in on the new reporting, saying the records show it was false when Kennedy said his trip had “nothing to do with vaccines”.
“This is a pattern, not a slip. RFK Jr has lied to the Senate, lied to the American people and jeopardized the health of children to advance his anti-vaccine agenda,” Markey said. “He should never have been confirmed, and he cannot be trusted to run [the Department of Health and Human Services] for even one more day.”
Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland, a member of the Senate health, education, labor and pensions committee, which oversees Kennedy’s department, repeated her call that the health secretary resign or be fired.
And Hawaii’s governor, Josh Green, a medical doctor who traveled to Samoa to help in the measles response in 2019, again called for him to step down.
“It is clear that Kennedy misled Congress about his intentions in Samoa and his stance on vaccinations during his confirmation hearings two years ago. It is time for him to immediately resign,” Green said. “He must do this for the safety and health of our country.”
The federal statute of limitations for lying to Congress is five years, meaning a new justice department under the next president in 2029 could theoretically investigate the case.
The Guardian sought comment from the Department of Health and Human Services about the Democratic officials’ calls for investigation or removal, but it did not immediately respond. In a previously issued statement it said Kennedy’s visit to Samoa “was unrelated to vaccines. Any claim or insinuation based on these letters that Secretary Kennedy lied under oath or to Congress is not only false but outright defamatory.”
Kennedy was not under oath during the two confirmation hearings. Wyden’s staff said whether he was under oath is not relevant since it is a crime to lie during a confirmation hearing either way.
