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Press Release

U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor Demands HHS Secretary Kennedy Resigns

Tampa, August 28, 2025
Today, U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor (FL‑14) released the following statement calling on Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to resign, citing a serious threat to America’s public health due to failed leadership and dangerous policies.
 
“Secretary Kennedy’s complete disregard for facts and basic science has disqualified him from leading the nation’s health agency. His outright destruction of lifesaving medical research and purge of America’s leading health experts will cost lives.
 
“For the sake of the American people – especially children, seniors and those with underlying health risks – the nation needs leadership grounded in expertise, based in science and committed to transparency. Secretary Kennedy is clearly unfit for the job, and he must resign immediately.”
 
Castor’s extensive list of reasons includes, but is not limited to, the following actions by RFK Jr. :
  • Dismantling public health infrastructure, putting Americans’ health and the nation’s medical system at severe risk. Sec. Kennedy has enacted massive layoffs across HHS , indiscriminately firing nearly 25% of the department’s workforce and trying to eliminate agencies illegally without congressional approval.
  • Promoting a chaotic, anti‑science agenda that is undermining vaccines and increasing the risk of preventable disease spread. This includes firing all 17 members of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) and replacing them with vaccine skeptics, fostering misinformation. It also includes a botched response to the measles outbreak, endorsing unscientific and harmful treatment alternatives and discouraging vaccination – leaving children at risk.
  • Slashing funding for life-saving medical research and innovation, including for treatments and cures for diseases like Alzheimer’s, cancer and diabetes. This will hurt families, eliminate thousands of good-paying jobs, and cede American dominance in health research to our foreign competitors like China.
  • Freezing or cutting vital public health funding to states, including $2.5 billion to Florida, impeding immunization efforts, infectious disease control, and local health operations.
  • Issuing confusing and contradictory guidance that undermines trust in the federal government. His “radical transparency” rhetoric is misleading – HHS has eliminated communications teams, restricted expert engagement, paused taxpayer-funded data releases and curtailed public access to information. This has hindered researchers’ and Americans’ ability to understand health trends and local impacts.
  • Rolling back access to high-quality, affordable health coverage, putting millions at risk of losing coverage and destabilizing health care systems.
  • Nearly eliminating funding for health care navigators, vital to serving Americans in appropriate ACA coverage, especially in Florida.
  • Attempting to halt fluoridation of drinking water - one of the major public health advancements in the U.S.
  • Allowing pervasive conflicts of interest among himself and senior advisors – including maintaining a law‑firm referral arrangement that awards him 10% of fees from pharmaceutical injury cases, despite leading HHS – raising additional ethical questions. 
 
The Food and Drug Administration’s former top vaccine official, Dr. Peter Marks wrote, “It has become clear that truth and transparency are not desired by the Secretary, but rather he wishes subservient confirmation of his misinformation and lies.”
 
The American Public Health Association Executive Director Georges C. Benjamin, MD wrote, "Americans deserve better than someone who is trying to impose his unscientific and judgmental view of public health and science. We deserve better than RFK, Jr. He demonstrated his incompetence in only a few weeks.  As a physician, I pledged to first do no harm and to speak up when I see harm being done by others. I ask my colleagues to join me and speak up. Secretary Robert Kennedy is a danger to the public’s health and should resign or be fired."  
 
The former Director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Demetre C. Daskalakis MD MPH wrote, "We are seven months into the new administration, and no CDC subject matter expert from my Center has ever briefed the Secretary.  I am not sure who the Secretary is listening to, but it is quite certainly not to us.  Unvetted and conflicted outside organizations seem to be the sources HHS use over the gold standard science of CDC and other reputable sources.  At a hearing, Secretary Kennedy said that Americans should not take medical advice from him.  To the contrary, an appropriately briefed and inquisitive Secretary should be a source of health information for the people he serves. As it stands now, I must agree with him, that he should not be considered a source of accurate information."
 
In July, the American Public Health Association (APHA), American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), American College of Physicians (ACP), Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA), Massachusetts Public Health Alliance (MPHA), Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM), and a pregnant physician filed suit in American Academy of Pediatrics v. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts to defend vaccine policy, and to put an end to the Secretary’s assault on science, public health and evidence-based medicine.