MSNBC host Joe Scarborough slammed Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. after his calamitous Senate hearing on Thursday.
Scarborough pulled no punches on Morning Joe, saying Kennedy Jr., 71, “lied repeatedly” over the course of the afternoon.
“As the senators said themselves, a lot of lies,” said Scarborough, 62, on Friday’s show. “[Kennedy] just lied repeatedly, according to the senators, according to the Republicans.”
Kennedy appeared before the Senate to face questions about his controversial alterations to America’s vaccination policy, firings of health experts at the Centers for Disease Control, and calls for his resignation from Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) employees. Throughout the proceedings, Kennedy engaged in fiery exchanges with Republican and Democratic senators alike, several of whom accused Kennedy of lying and making things up about the negative effects of vaccines.
Scarborough was baffled by Kennedy’s contradictory opinions on Operation Warp Speed, a signature effort of President Donald Trump’s first term to quickly develop Covid vaccines.
During the hearing, Kennedy called the United States’ response to the pandemic the “worst in the world.”
“We literally did worse than any country in the world, and the people at CDC who oversaw that process, who put masks on our children, who closed our schools, are the people who will be leaving,” he said.
However, Kennedy also agreed with Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy that Trump deserves a Nobel Prize for Operation Warp Speed, the initial vaccine rollout.
“It is just really unbelievable, J-Mart, that you would actually have a cabinet member for Donald Trump undermine what all of those senators, Republican and Democrat alike, were saying could have been Donald Trump’s greatest achievement in Operation Warp Speed, undermining it and saying more people died from Donald Trump’s actions than from Covid itself,” Scarborough said. “Why he is at HHS remains a question that there doesn’t seem to be any logical answer to.”
Scarborough joins a swath of pundits who have ripped Kennedy, including comedian Stephen Colbert, CNN pundit Van Jones, and fellow MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell.
Members of the Trump administration have defended Kennedy after the hearing. Vice President J.D. Vance accused the Senate of asking the health secretary “gotcha” questions.
“You all support off-label, untested, and irreversible hormonal ‘therapies’ for children, mutilating our kids and enriching big pharma. You’re full of s–t and everyone knows it,” Vance said on X, referring to hormone therapy for transgender children. Treatment for gender dysphoria for children does not include surgery, though this has become a frequent talking point on the right.
It is unclear if some of the Republican Senators who grilled Kennedy, such as Bill Cassidy and John Barrasso, support gender-affirming care for minors.
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