On Wednesday, the Senate Finance Committee held the first of two confirmation hearings for Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump’s nominee to be the secretary of Health and Human Services. (He faces a different Senate committee on Thursday.) The political scion who has vowed to “Make America Healthy Again” is known for flouting conventional medical wisdom, promoting vaccine skepticism, and platforming COVID-19 misinformation. Those tendencies came under the spotlight during his hearing, with Democratic senators expressing outrage over Kennedy’s past statements and harshly questioning him over his priorities. Republicans were mostly friendly, though one key vote, Louisiana’s Bill Cassidy, did not tip his hand either way. Below, how the hearing played out in real time:

The Senate Finance Committee wrapped up its confirmation hearing for Kennedy shortly after 1:30 p.m. But this is just the beginning of the process for the nominee. On Thursday, Kennedy will sit for his second hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee at 10 a.m.

Democratic senator Tina Smith of Minnesota asked Kennedy about his past comments in an interview that drew a link between school shooters and antidepressant use.

“Do you believe, as you said, that antidepressants cause school shootings? This should be a simple question,” Smith said.

Kennedy responded, “I don’t think anybody can answer that question, and I didn’t answer that question. I said it should be studied along with other potential culprits like social media.”

Republican senator Roger Marshall of Kansas asked Kennedy to lay out his “prescription” to make America healthy again. Kennedy began by saying that America is having “epidemics” of chronic illness, noting the high rates of obesity as well as autoimmune and neurological diseases.

Kennedy indicated that one of his top priorities will be to research the issues with the nation’s food supply and the source of these medical concerns. “We don’t have good science on all of these things, and that is deliberate. That’s a deliberate choice not to study the things that are truly making us sick, that are not only contributing to chronic disease, but the mortalities from infectious disease. We need to get a handle on this, because if we don’t, it’s an existential threat,” he said.

Kennedy repeats the line that people are unhappy w/Medicaid and premiums are too high.
Medicaid has no premiums

Surreal moment just now

Bernie Sanders displays “Unvaxxed Unafraid” baby onesies sold by Children’s Health Defense, which RFK Jr founded.

“Are you supportive of these onesies??,” Sanders thundered. pic.twitter.com/Jcp44fTl1X

Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont asked Kennedy if he believed that America should guarantee health care for everyone “as a human right.” Kennedy did not give a yes-or-no answer.

“In the way that free speech is a human right, I would say it’s different because free speech doesn’t cost anybody anything,” he said. “In health care, if you smoke cigarettes for 20 years and you get cancer, you are now taking from the pool.”

SENATOR THOM TILLIS (R): Are you a conspiracy theorist?

RFK JR: That's a term used against me to make me........

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