RFK Jr. Pressured CDC, Internal HHS Emails Show — Sanders Releases the Evidence

So here's the short version: Sen. Bernie Sanders just dropped a pile of internal government emails that, if they say what he claims, show RFK Jr. — the man in charge of America's public health — was pulling strings behind the scenes to water down vaccine messaging and push his long-held anti-vaccine views onto the CDC.

Sanders, who sits as the top Democrat on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, released the emails Thursday. He says he got them from Dr. Debra Houry, the CDC's former chief medical officer, who resigned last August after the CDC director she worked under — Susan Monarez — was suddenly fired.

So what's actually in these emails? A few things stand out.

First, during flu season in February 2025, an HHS communications official emailed CDC colleagues and told them to immediately pull all ad buys related to flu shots or anything encouraging vaccinations. The staffer who received that order wrote to her supervisor that she was told the request 'came directly from the Secretary' — meaning RFK Jr. himself. A CDC official flagged this as a serious problem at the time, warning it presented 'significant reputational risk to the agency' and could create legal issues with already-funded contracts.

Second, the emails show RFK Jr.'s team was demanding political sign-off over major CDC decisions. In mid-August 2025, a senior HHS aide emailed then-CDC Director Susan Monarez saying there was an 'absolute need for political review of major policy decisions at CDC,' and that Kennedy's adviser and Monarez's chief of staff both had to greenlight decisions before they went into effect. Eight days after that email, Monarez was fired.

Monarez had previously testified before Congress that Kennedy pressured her to agree to changes to the childhood vaccination schedule and to commit to firing CDC scientists — and that when she refused, Kennedy told her he'd already talked to the White House about removing her. Kennedy flatly denied those accounts and accused her of lying.

HHS has strongly denied the allegations, calling Monarez insubordinate for refusing to implement executive orders.

Why does this matter to you? Because those 'vaccine campaigns' that got scrapped? Those were public health messages telling people to get their flu shots — ads already paid for and running on social media, in magazines, potentially on bus shelters. The decisions made inside these government emails have real downstream effects: fewer vaccination reminders, a scaled-back childhood immunization schedule, and growing measles outbreaks in parts of the country where vaccination rates have slipped.

The CDC also ended up cutting its recommended childhood vaccines from 17 to 11, a move that health groups say could leave kids vulnerable to diseases like hepatitis A, hepatitis B, and the flu. A federal judge later ruled in March that changes to the vaccine advisory panel were unlawful. HHS appealed.

At his own Senate confirmation hearings, Kennedy promised he would not cut vaccine funding or change vaccine recommendations. NPR's reporting confirms he did both.

Sanders is now calling on the Republican who chairs the HELP Committee, Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, to hold formal hearings — and is demanding Kennedy resign. Cassidy himself has previously called the CDC chaos concerning, but no hearing has been scheduled.