RFK Jr. wants federal health data so he can show vaccines are unsafe, Trump transition co-chair says

A co-chair of Donald Trump’s transition team said Trump supporter Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wants access to federal health data so he can show vaccines are unsafe and lead to them being pulled from the market in a second Trump administration. Howard Lutnick echoed a number of Kennedy’s debunked anti-vaccine talking points in a CNN interview Wednesday, including falsehoods about the vaccine schedule and the disproven theory that vaccines cause autism. Trump has talked often about how Kennedy, who suspended his own presidential bid and endorsed him in August, will have a big role to play if the former president returns to the White House. While Lutnick said Kennedy would not be chosen as secretary of health and human services, he was not specific about what Kennedy’s role might be. Lutnick made the comments the same day that Kennedy told NewsNation that Trump asked him to “reorganize” agencies including the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and some agencies under the Department of Agriculture. The comments by Lutnick raised immediate concerns among public health experts that giving influence to one of the most prominent anti-vaccine activists in the world could lead to what one said would be “severe health consequences” for Americans, especially children. They come just days before the Nov. 5 election and as Trump, a Republican, and Democrat Kamala Harris are vying to sway late-deciding voters to their side.Lutnick, the CEO of the financial services company Cantor Fitzgerald, told CNN that Kennedy wants access to data “so he can say these things are unsafe” and that will stop the sales.“He says, if you give me the data, all I want is the data and I’ll take on the data and show that it’s not safe. And then if you pull the product liability, the companies will yank these vaccines right off of the market. So that’s his point,” Lutnick said.