'That was your promise, Mr. Kennedy!' Warren goes off in explosive hearing over vaccines
September 04, 2025
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) hammered Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Thursday during a fiery hearing over his recent moves with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and firing the full panel of the vaccine advisory board.
At issue for Warren is that Kennedy repeatedly promised during his confirmation hearing that vaccines would continue to be available for free to anyone who wants one. That is no longer the case, however. As a result of HHS recommendations, pharmacies like those at Walmart, CVS, and Walgreens are not allowed to give vaccines in certain states without a doctor's note, The Washington Post explained. In all states, Kennedy has made it impossible for anyone who is healthy and under age 65 to obtain the COVID-19 vaccine booster.
Warren tried to get him to agree that it is official HHS policy that anyone who wants a vaccine can get one for free.
"So you're saying that is now the official rule that anybody is eligible to get a booster by just walking into the pharmacy?" she asked.
Kennedy replied, "It's not recommended for healthy people." The comment then effectively removes everyone from accessing it.
"No, no. If you don't recommend it, the consequence, in many states, is that you can't walk into a pharmacy and get one. It means insurance companies don't have to cover the $200 or so cost. As Sen. Dr. [Bill] Cassidy (R-LA) said, you are effectively denying people vaccines," explained Warren.
Kennedy continued to maintain that anyone could get the vaccine who wanted it, which Warren continued to try to explain was not true if he didn't recommend it.
Kennedy then quibbled, asking, "We're not going to recommend a product for which there's no clinical data for that indication. Is that what I should be doing?"
"What you should be doing is honoring your promise that you made when you were looking to get confirmed in this job," she demanded. "Like this is — you promised that you would not take away vaccines from anyone who wanted them. You just changed the classification of the COVID vaccine."
"I'm not taking them away from people, Senator," Kennedy continued to insist, not understanding that his personal recommendations are now official government policy. "Most Americans are going to be able to get it from their pharmacy for free."
"Everyone who wants it. That was your promise, Mr. Kennedy," Warren said.
"I never promised that I was going to recommend products for which there is no indication—" he said, trying to backtrack.
He then accused Warren of taking money from pharmaceutical companies. STAT has previously debunked the claim.
Warren doesn't take corporate money; instead, she takes money from individuals and worker-specific and ideological political action committees.
See the clip below or at the link here.
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