Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has an uncertain path ahead of him as he looks to get confirmed as the Trump administration’s health secretary next year — even after a barrage of meetings with senators this week.
While supportive posts on X rolled in from some of the senators who met with Kennedy, other key senators remained noncommittal when asked if they’d back his nomination in January.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska declined to share where she stood on Kennedy’s nomination on Friday. But she told NOTUS that they had a “good discussion about a lot of different issues, including vaccines.”
“Existentially, everything’s just fine,” Murkowski said about their meeting.
Kennedy’s long week of traipsing around the Hill — accompanied by a large security detail — did not include much time for answering reporters’ questions. He declined to respond to any policy-related queries and only supplied brief answers like “it was good” and “very productive” when asked how his meetings with senators were going.
“They’re private conversations,” he told NOTUS when asked if he had any standout conversations with elected officials.
Kennedy’s views on a variety of subjects, from vaccines to abortion, are under close scrutiny as he makes his way through the Senate in his effort to win over votes. Democrats seem unlikely to help Republicans get him across the finish line, so he can only afford a couple of holdouts.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia said that she and Kennedy discussed vaccines and that he told her more than once that he’s “pro-science, not anti-vax.”
“I enjoyed the talk. I thought he was very open,” Capito said.
But Capito said that she hadn’t yet determined whether she had any concerns with Kennedy’s nomination.
Some senators who met with Kennedy this week, like Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, declined to comment on their meetings with Kennedy on Friday.
Other senators who met with Kennedy told NOTUS that they were confident that Kennedy, a former Democrat who once primaried Joe Biden, would fall in line with Trump and the rest of the Republican Party.
“[Kennedy] said he serves at the pleasure of the president, and he would be 100% in alignment with his policies,” Republican Sen. Ted Budd said, adding that Kennedy told him he was committed to supporting President-elect Trump’s efforts to restrict abortion.
Budd said that while he and Kennedy didn’t speak about vaccines, he isn’t concerned about Kennedy’s position because he thinks Kennedy has “moderated some of his stances and come up with a good pathway forward.”
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, which will hold some of the hearings on Kennedy’s nomination, said that Kennedy is “doing good.”
“Most people on our committee have zero complaints,” Tuberville said.
Tuberville said that he supports Kennedy’s plans for reforming the Food and Drug Administration and National Institutes of Health because “we’re obviously not doing the right things with all the new things that are going on, especially with our kids, like the increase in autism.” (While rates of autism in children have increased over time, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention attributes that mostly to increased awareness of the disorder and improved diagnostic tools.)
Tuberville was among the five senators who formed the Make America Healthy Again Caucus after meeting with Kennedy this week.
Other senators who met with Kennedy were more enthusiastic about the potential for Kennedy to shake up the public health establishment — like Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky.
“We had a good meeting, and I’m supportive of his nomination,” Paul said. Paul recently introduced legislation to limit some forms of infectious disease research in the U.S. and said that he and Kennedy discussed this research. While Paul said that he didn’t know if Kennedy was supportive of the specific act that he introduced, he said that Kennedy’s “generally been supportive of things I’m doing. You can look at his previous comments and go by that.”
Democratic Sen. John Fetterman didn’t have a formal sit-down with Kennedy, but the two had a cordial exchange when the senator bumped into Kennedy in the halls of the Russell office building on Wednesday. On Friday, Fetterman told NOTUS that he’s planning on meeting with Kennedy in January, saying, “We’re on the schedule.”
When asked if he was supportive of Kennedy’s plans for food and agriculture in the U.S., Fetterman said, “I’ve heard things, and some things are troubling, or perhaps not true.” He added that the nominees deserve to be heard before they are judged.
When it comes to his Democratic colleagues, Fetterman said that he hopes they choose to have meetings with Trump’s nominees as well.
Fetterman’s hopes seem likely to come true with at least one of those colleagues with regard to Kennedy.
“[Kennedy’s] obviously said some outlandish statements,” Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden said, but added, “if he asks to visit with me, I’ll do it.”
One Republican senator told NOTUS that while they haven’t yet met with Kennedy, he’s looking forward to doing so and hearing his views.
“I’ve not interviewed with him yet, so it’s hard for me to say how I’m feeling about it,” Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana told NOTUS. Cassidy is currently the ranking member of the HELP Committee and will chair it in the new year.
When asked if he was concerned about Kennedy’s views on vaccines, Cassidy said, “I would rather make my own impression and judge him.”
Kennedy’s visits around the Hill were happening as the threat of a shutdown grew throughout the course of the week and as other Trump nominees also made the rounds.
Even though he’s one of Trump’s highest-profile cabinet picks, members of the public still keep him humble.
“Are you Pete Hegseth?” a tourist asked Kennedy at one point. Kennedy just chuckled.
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Margaret Manto is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.