The Irony of RFK Jr.’s Conflicts of Interest Gambit

RFK Jr. purged the CDC’s vaccine advisory committee claiming they were in the pocket of the pharmaceutical industry. But who is really conflicted?

On June 9, 2025, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), fired all 17 voting members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which advises the CDC. In an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, RFK Jr. wrote, “The committee has been plagued with persistent conflicts of interest and has become little more than a rubber stamp for any vaccine… A clean sweep is needed to re-establish public confidence in vaccine science.”

RFK Jr. cited a 2009 report that—as described by Jessica Steier and her team at Unbiased Science—“fails to give the true context of the report,” which “did not find serious conflicts of interest. Instead, it showed that many forms (97%) had errors and omissions due to form errors, such as putting information in the wrong section, or failing to initial and date in the correct places. Furthermore, recent independent investigations into ACIP members found ‘no substantial conflicts or disclosure errors’.”

RFK Jr.’s bogus claims that the CDC advisory committee is a shill for the pharmaceutical industry is an attempt to distract the public from his real conflicts of interest. RFK Jr is the driving force behind hundreds of lawsuits by people suing Merk’s HPV vaccine, Gardasil. No one recognized this obvious conflict of interest more than Senator Elizabeth Warren (D, MA), whose questions before a Senate confirmation hearing on January 25, 2025, provided a frightening glimpse into the future.

Warren: In the past two years, you’ve raked in $2.5 million from a law firm called Wisner Baum. You go online and do commercials to encourage people to sign up with Wisner Baum to join lawsuits against vaccine makers. And for everyone who signs up, you personally get paid. And, if they win their case, you get 10% of what they win. So, if you bring in somebody who gets $10 million, you walk away with $1 million. Mr. Kennedy, will you agree that you won’t take any compensation from any lawsuits against drug companies while you are Secretary and for four years afterwards.

Kennedy: I’m not going to agree to that.

Warren: As Secretary of HHS, if you get confirmed, you could influence every one of those lawsuits:

• You can publish your anti-vaccine conspiracies, but this time on US government letterheads, something a jury might be impressed by. (On June 5, RFK Jr. wrote a letter under an HHS letterhead stating that Covid vaccines for young children and pregnant women were dangerous and ineffective.)

• You could appoint a vaccine panel who share your anti-vax views and let them do your dirty work. (On June 9, RFK Jr. fired the entire vaccine advisory committee to the CDC. Two days later, he appointed eight new members, many of whom shared RFK Jr.’s anti-vaccine, anti-science views.)

• You could tell the CDC vaccine panel to remove a particular vaccine from the vaccine schedule (On May 27, RFK Jr. announced that he would remove young children and pregnant women from the Covid vaccine schedule.)

• You could remove vaccines from special compensation programs, which would open manufacturers to mass torts. You could make more injuries eligible for compensation even if there is no causal evidence…You could change which claims are compensated in the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. (On June 16, RFK Jr. paid $150,000 to an Arizona law firm with an expertise in the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program that had a national reputation for litigating claims of vaccine “injuries.”) I’m asking you to commit right now that you will not take a financial stake in every one of those lawsuits so that what you do as Secretary will also benefit you financially down the line.

Kennedy: I have complied with all the ethics rules.

Warren: No one should be fooled here. Kennedy can kill off access to vaccines and make millions of dollars while he does it. Kids might die, but Robert Kennedy can keep cashing in.

Kennedy: Senator, I support vaccines. I support the childhood schedule.

The day before the Senate confirmation hearing before the HELP committee, Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of President John F. Kennedy, sounded a similar warning about her first cousin, whom she had witnessed firsthand growing up. Caroline Kennedy wrote that RFK Jr. “preys on the desperation of parents of sick children,” noting that he had vaccinated his own children while discouraging others from vaccinating theirs. Regarding his lawsuits against the HPV vaccine, Caroline wrote, “He is willing to enrich himself by denying access to a vaccine that can prevent almost all forms of cervical cancer, which has been safely administered to millions of boys and girls.” She continued, “Unlike Bobby, I try not to speak for my father—but I am certain that he and my uncle Bobby [RFK Jr.’s father], who gave their lives in public services, and my uncle Teddy, who devoted his Senate career to improving health care, would be disgusted.”

On February 13, 2025, RFK Jr. was confirmed to head HHS. He is now poised to make himself and his personal injury lawyer friends richer. Let the grift begin. We can’t say we haven’t been warned.