Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at a hearing Tuesday faced tough questions from Senate appropriators, including some from his own party, over proposed cuts to biomedical research, the agency’s reorganization efforts and changes to local health grants.
Kennedy, testifying before the Senate Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee, sometimes deflected and other times fought back as he outlined his vision for reducing and preventing chronic disease through his department’s $94 billion budget request for fiscal 2026.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., in her first hearing as subcommittee chair, told Kennedy that “HHS has always worked with Congress when considering and designing reorganizations, and I encourage you and your staff to work closely with us as you move forward.”
The hearing follows Kennedy’s back-to-back appearances before the House Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee and the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee last week.
Similar to those appearances, Kennedy declined to provide specifics on the HHS reorganization efforts, citing a court gag order in responding to full Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins, R-Maine. Collins pressed him about delayed grant opportunities for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Healthy Brain Initiative.
Collins also expressed concern that the budget request would eliminate funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which she called “critical.” She asked for Kennedy’s rationale for seeking to end funding and his commitment to restore the program.
Kennedy said the administration’s rationale was that the White House’s policies would lower energy costs and make this program an unnecessary subsidy for the energy industry.
“If this doesn’t happen and Congress appropriates the funding then I, of course, will spend it,” he said.
Fiery exchanges
Democrats questioned whether Kennedy could provide answers about how and why certain budget decisions were being made.
Kennedy and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., ranking member on the full Appropriations Committee, engaged in a heated exchange, with Capito at one point asking the secretary to hold back and allow Murray to proceed.
Murray took aim at HHS staffing cuts, delays to grant funding and the cancellation of clinical trials.
Kennedy responded: “Senator, I don’t trust your information with all due respect.”
“You came here to argue with me,” Murray said. “I came here to ask you questions about your budget request.”
Sen. Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill., asked Kennedy if he knew the No. 1 cause of preventable death in America, a reference to tobacco, which has been at the top in the U.S. for decades.
“I know what the No. 1 cause of death is in this country,” said Kennedy. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”
Durbin criticized the department’s mass firing of personnel at CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health and the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Tobacco Products.
“If we are genuinely concerned, and I believe you are about the health of America and making it better, something as basic as the No. 1 preventable cause of death is not served by that kind of dismissal,” Durbin said.
Biomedical research
Senators asked Kennedy about proposed funding cuts to the National Institutes of Health, lower utilization of funds appropriated for biomedical research this year and policy changes limiting indirect costs.
Kennedy, calling out a handful of individuals wearing purple shirts at Tuesday’s hearing “as an emblem of their commitment to solving the Alzheimer’s crisis,” said the disease is “a very, very good example of how NIH has gone off the rails over the past 20 years.”
He alleged that NIH has only one hypothesis for investigating the disease, research into amyloid plaques, which demonstrates “corruption within the agency.”
But Capito noted that she has heard from schools in her state and nationwide about the impact of NIH capping indirect costs for universities conducting federally funded research.
“I am concerned that our country is falling behind in biomedical research,” she said. “This should be a concern that we all share and make investments in. Investing in biomedical research has proven to save lives while exponentially strengthening the U.S. economy.”
West Virginia University, as a member of the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities, is working with other schools and research organizations to create a new model for these costs.
Kennedy told Capito that he was aware of this effort but had not met with the schools involved.
Sens. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., and John Kennedy, R-La., defended the administration’s efforts to crack down on indirect costs at universities.
“Only in the American government do we think throwing money at the problem will eventually fix it,” Mullin said.
Subcommittee ranking member Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., expressed concern that NIH had spent $3 billion less of appropriated funds compared to the same period last year.
“Whose decision is it to withhold thousands of grants and billions in funding for lifesaving biomedical research?” Baldwin asked, adding that 3,200 fewer grants were being funded.
“We are not abandoning any lifesaving research,” Kennedy replied, saying the department was eliminating duplicative programs and administrative costs.
Local impact
Both Capito and Baldwin also expressed ongoing concerns about affected programs in their districts.
Most staff employed by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health were let go as part of HHS reorganization efforts in April.
Capito has been active in pushing to reinstate this staff, as the agency’s research facility in Morgantown, W.Va., was shut down in April.
Capito said that she was “pleased” that HHS had brought back some specialized NIOSH employees this month, but that was only the first step.
“I support the president’s vision to right-size our government, but as you and I have discussed, I do not think eliminating NIOSH programs will accomplish that goal. I encourage you to look closely at all of NIOSH’s offices and bring back additional critical staff,” Capito said.
Baldwin similarly called attention to the CDC’s reported inability to help Milwaukee, which sought assistance addressing a lead crisis in its public schools through the CDC’s Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program. Congress appropriated $51 million to CDC for lead poisoning prevention, she said.
“Despite what you told me last week that you have no intention of eliminating this program, you fired the entire office responsible for carrying it out,” Baldwin said. “So CDC told Milwaukee public schools that they simply couldn’t help.”
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