Bulwark Takes - BREAKING: CDC in Turmoil, Mass Resignations Under RFK

Episode Date: August 28, 2025

Sam Stein, Jonathan Cohn and Dan Diamond (Washington Post) are going to to live to cover the chaos at the CDC. From Dr. Demetre Daskalakis’s blistering letter slamming RFK Jr. to a wave of departures that put America’s health security at risk, they’ll cover the breaking fallout and what it means going forward.

Save up to 50% off at Ecotech Windows and doors. Pay no tax or don't pay till 2026. You'll see the difference right away with Ecotechwindows.ca. Quality and comfort you can trust and afford, ecotechwindows.ca. All right, we are live. My name is Sam Stein. I'm managing editor at the Bullwark.

I am fortunate enough to be joined by Jonathan Cohen, who is author of our Breakdown Newsletter. And a true treat, Dan Diamond of the Washington Post, he came out of leave for this specific night. He's been doing great work on the beat at the post. We're here to talk about what I think may be one of the more potentially consequential evenings in our nation's literal health and certainly at the CDC where we've had

what appears to be a mass resignation and a potentially big firing involving RFK Jr. who heads HHS and the director of the CDC, who may or may not currently be the director of the CDC. We just don't know, Suzanne Monares. Dan, I'm going to start with you because you broke this story. Why don't you give us kind of the lay of the land and what happened today so that people who are tuning in might understand?

Well, Sam, what happened today was pretty messy, and I think even as we're talking now, some of the things are still in dispute. But Susan Monteraz, who had been confirmed as the CDC's director only a month ago and was thought to be kind of a part in the choice of word, but a bulwark against RFK juniors. We'll take it. We'll take it.

Against his efforts to potentially overall vaccine policy. She was seen as someone who was a more moderate choice than her first pick, an anti-vaccine activist named Dave Weldon. She'd only been there a few weeks, and words started trickling out today that she was out. And it was unclear exactly what had happened. I talked to Trump officials who said they had heard that she'd been insubordinate. My colleagues, Lena Sun, Lauren Weber, had also gotten word that she was being removed. But even as of mid-afternoon, it wasn't clear whether she'd been fired, whether she'd resigned.

I had a succession of calls in about 10 minutes where I heard all various options. She'd been escorted out of the building. She was writing a resignation letter. She was going to be fired if she didn't leave. But long story short, the head of the CDC, the Trump officials want her gone and made that very clear by putting out a public statement. And that was followed by the resignation of some very senior CDC officials, career officials who have been there for, in some cases, decades. Dan Jernigan, who has helped lead the infectious disease response.

Dmitri Daskalakis, who worked on MPox in addition to COVID and other issues. Deb Hore, the chief medical officer. So whether or not Susan Monterez, Israel is not the CDC director, this whole layer below her is now gone. And officials are saying they are doing it because they are worried. read about what RFK Jr. is trying to do to the agency. The fight with Monteraz, we heard at the post, and I've seen other outlets report this, was largely around vaccine policy and whether she would kow to what RFK Jr. wanted to do. So Jonathan, let's assume, I think it's a fair

assumption, that the catalyzing event here is vaccine policy, as Dan's talking about. Lay out what the actual vaccine policy decisions at issue are here. Yeah. So, I mean, there's a bunch, actually, and there's several pieces to this. They are in the process of revising recommendations for right now, first of all, COVID vaccines. They just came out this week with a new recommendation from the, which came from the Food and Drug Administration, actually. And it gets very confusing because there's recommendations for authorization from FDA, then CDC's committee makes its own recommendations. But they're in the process, and they've been sort of in the process of revising this of deciding who should be authorized or recommended to get COVID shots.

And there's a big, there's a big dispute. Career scientists at CDC, the most of the medical establishment in the United States believe, for example, pregnant women should be getting it. They think that children, even if they're not high risk, should be getting the shots. Kennedy and his team are pushing back against that. So we have that going on. We have separately some other disputes, debates playing out over some future recommendations about other vaccines. There's an ongoing dispute about who, what will be included in liability protection. And some of these decisions are CDC decisions, some are HHS decisions, some involve FDA. But CDC is directly or indirectly part, should, would normally be part of most of these discussions.

And so there's a big, there's just a big divide between the scientists at CDC. see and RFK and the and just and briefly just talk about what he did uh RFK junior did with the advisory committee which kind of preceded all this stuff yeah yeah so there's this advisory committee which is outside uh scientists who are brought in on sort of staggered terms not historically a political group it could be controversial but not a political group per se um and presidents come in and then they sort of appoint new members or they get appointed through HHS and it's their job to make recommendations over who should get vaccines, what vaccines and who should get them. Kennedy came in. It wouldn't be normal. There would be some vacancies, naturally. It would be

normal for him to replace, you know, fill the vacancies. But he went beyond that and he basically purged him. He got rid of everybody. He said, thank you for your service. You're all gone. He said later, he thought they were corrupted by conflicts of interest, which was an unfair charge, but that's a, you know, a separate story and has brought in new people, almost all of whom are well known for their being as skeptics, opponents of vaccination. And frankly, I don't want to paint them with one brush. But you have people who I think is safe to say their views are quite outside the mainstream and are very controversial.

So, Dan, I was, I've been talking to some folks. I'm like, I'm not JV compared to you and Cohn when it comes to reporting on this. I'm like, bit string type down the totem pole. I don't feel that way. You're always breaking stuff that I'm jealous of. Well, thank you. I appreciate. Well, I'll vent by you guys later.

But I was talking to some folks about the leadership structure. And the reason that this at the CDC and the reason this hit home for them is that they felt like the people who were there, Dan Jernigan, Dimitri specifically, the reason they had stuck around for seven months is that they felt like they would stay and try to protect the sign. and that it was only when it became clear that they couldn't protect the science or that the science was being manipulated, that they would resign in protest. And so the resignations tonight by those officials really stood out to them as sort of a signature moment where we've crossed some kind of Rubicon. Can you talk a little bit about whether that's what you're picking up within the CDC that they felt like something happened in which they no longer could protect the science

around vaccinations? You're asking me? Yes. Well, let me offer two caveats first. First, as you alluded to, Sam, I have been on paternity leave. I'm just coming back. I was not planning on doing any TV or anything, like any big stories. It's not TV, baby.

It's YouTube. Well, and thank God for that because I'm dressed accordingly. But so I haven't been as plugged in the past couple months. And also, we have a wonderful CDC reporter, Lena Sun at the Post, who really is like the dean of the beat. She's the best. what she says goes. But I will say, yeah, the interpretation that this is a signal event at the CDC, absolutely, obviously. These are people who, regardless of administration, had earned the faith

and trust of people inside and also outside CDC. If Dan Jernigan or someone like Deb Horry, your viewers might remember early in the COVID response, it wasn't a political official who sounded the alarm about being scared about COVID, it was a career official at CDC who, on a teleconference, said, get ready that things are going to be rough in the coming weeks and months. So career officials at CDC carry a lot of weight in the field and to lose so many in one day regardless of what happens to Susan Monterey. That alone is like a red alert story.

But losing also the politically appointed director, and that may or may not happen, according to Susan Monterez and her lawyers. It does feel like a dividing line, potentially of CDC, you know, up until this point and beyond. Talk quickly, Dan, about the efforts by Monteraz to, or her allies, I should say, to salvage things or to at least protect her. I'll just read a little bit because this worth timeline,

and then after I read the timeline, I'm going to pass it to you. So what happens here is all this door, all this reporting breaks out that she's out. the Department of Health and Human Services Twitter account actually at about 535 tweets out that she is no longer to the director of Centers for Disease Control Prevention. They thank her for her service or dedicated service to the American people. They say Secretary Kennedy, that's R.P. Junior, has full confidence in his team at the CBC, who will continue to be vigilant in protecting Americans against infectious diseases at home and abroad. Then not less, not even two hours later, Mark Zade, a well-known lawyer in D.C., who represents whistleblowers,

and government officials. He says he and Abby Lull, who's another well-known lawyer representing a number of people who are suing or in the crossages of the Trump administration, say they represent Monter's. And contrary to government statements, now she nor has resigned nor yet been fired. And Mark says she will not resign. I reached out to Mark. I said, what's going on here? His response to me is, quote, we're waiting to see what the White House wants to do. Our view is that only the president can fire her as of 843 mark says that still has not happened so that's where we're at but prior to all this as you report there was an effort to try to i don't know what you would call it save her make sure that she wasn't fired how would you describe it and what tell us what

happened i think the play by play probably best to start on monday uh when there was a meeting and we get into this on our story at the washington post but there was a meeting between uh rfk junior his aides Stephanie Speer specifically and Susan Monteres, where she was pushed, we understand, from our sourcing on whether she would agree to make coronavirus vaccine changes. And her response essentially was, I can't give you a blanket. I will agree to make these changes. I need to talk to my experts. I can't talk in hypotheticals that I would necessarily and specifically do what the Trump

administration wants me to do. That didn't sit well. and some pressure that I think had already been on her in recent weeks quickly ratcheted up. There were a conversation with the White House, other officials at HHS. Our understanding is Susan Monterez reached out to Senator Bill Cassidy, who your viewers might recall played a crucial role in confirming RFK Jr. Had Senator Cassidy, a Republican doctor who chairs the Senate's health committee, if he had said, I'm not going to support RFK Jr., his nomination likely would have done. or it certainly would have been a lot harder to get him in seat. Instead, Bill Cassidy said, you know, I feel comfortable

that RFK Jr. has made commitments to me. He's going to protect vaccines. He's going to be responsive to me in the Senate. So I will vote to confirm him. Well, here we are, Sam and John, some months later. And there has been moment after moment where it's kind of like, what was Bill Cassidy thinking? Because RFK Jr. does thing after thing,

that would seem to fly in the face of what he promised to Cassidy. But regardless, Monterez reached out to Cassidy. Cassidy got involved. Our understanding is that only made our FK Jr. Angrier, accused Montereza being further insubordinate. She was told not to reach out to senators. Other lawmakers, other officials got involved. And the pressure mounted at the point today.

She was basically told, if you don't resign, we will fire you. There was a question about whether she could be fired, who could do it, could President Trump do it, what the circumstances be. And I was saying this to you right before we jumped on, Sam, there was real confusion about where Susan Monteraz was today. Like I had officials texting me saying, do you know where she is? Because we're trying to track her down

and get her on the phone. Do we know where she is? I was told by somebody, I'm not sure I should say without further confirmation. I think we might have, we have multiple sources that she was in D.C. today at the CDC office.

But regardless, her lawyers have said she's not gotten word. She's essentially daring the White House to try to fire her. and that she is holding herself up as a protector of public health and science and saying if RFK Jr. and the administration try to fire me, it will be over these grounds of trying to undermine public health. Cohn, talk to us about what the, with the scientific community and the people you talk to are worried about right now or what they're thinking right now. Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, there's sort of a couple layers of this. And first, I just say, again,

the reporting on this was great, Dan and you and your colleague, just fantastic reporting. You know, there's a couple of layers. So first, this is not the picture of an organization that is well run, right? Actually, I was talking to a she's jaw a little earlier and he said there's a sort of question, is this malice or incompetence, which is, you know, there's a certain, you know, as a Washington writer, you're like, wow, can you believe how it kind of disorganized? They don't know what they're doing and this is so backbiting. But, you know, this is our command and control center for public health. This is not a place you want chaos. It's not a place you want vacancy.

So there's a, obviously, there's a concern that this critically important. agency is now, you know, not only has it been sort of hammered with staff cuts through Doge, it's had, you know, a reorganization is losing funds. And now it's got all kinds of leadership vacancies and losing, as Dan was saying, decades of experience, decades of expertise. And whether or not you think they did a good job in COVID or not, that is just not easy to replace. So there's that concern. But then there's the second layer of concern. And again, this is what Dan and you were just talking about, which is if you kind of break down the back and forth what was going on. And that conversation that Dan just related to us, if you think about what's

going on here, we have Kennedy and whoever from the administration is saying, we want you, the director of the CDC, to endorse what we want to do on vaccines. And she is saying, she didn't say no, exactly, right? I mean, she said, I am not in position to do it. I'm the director of the CDC. It's my job to represent the science. I need to go to my scientist and come back to you and say, this is what they said. I can't give you an yes or no answer without consulting them. And that was not good enough. So this is a very, you know, this is the job of the CDC. I mean, this is a Senate confirmation position, her position. It's an agency created by Congress to to protect the health of the United States based on science. This is her standing up and saying

that is what I'm going to do. And this is the White House. This is Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert Kennedy, saying, no, no, we know what the answers. We know what we want to do. And if you won't get in line, you're going to lose your job. And that's a very chilling prospect. Dan, you got to go because you're a new dad and you got new dad responsibilities. Also, I'm in the baby's room. You really need to go. But before you go, I just want to open up for any last thoughts about, maybe put it this way. This is obviously not the end of the story.

We don't even know if it's the beginning of the end of the story. What are you looking out for in the next hours ahead, days ahead? You mean I should tell my competitors the follow-up stories we're working on? No, I just want to know. Yeah, well, sure. Why not? You can just, you can text me later. You don't have to get everybody in it.

I mean, I think the larger questions are, what checks are there on RFK Jr at this point, for one? Senator Bill Cassidy, yeah, he claimed that he had some checks on him. This is a perfect case study of he doesn't, as far as we can tell from our reporting. Like the check on RFK Jr. was not to confirm him, but they voted to confirm him. And now he has this relatively free hand to make changes. I think that's one. Sorry, someone's calling me. I think...

Is it R.K. Jr.? I don't know if you guys can hear my phone ringing. No, no, we can't. It's fine. It's fine. A second question would be, what is the public health of the nation going to look like in a world where some of these officials aren't in seat and where RFK Jr. is installing more allies? And I really do have to go, I think. I've got to take this call. All right.

Dan, thank you so much, man. Really appreciate it. I appreciate it. Cohn, let's pick up on that because it does seem like there aren't really any checks. And it doesn't seem like Trump actually, Trump himself, which would, in theory, be the check, the remaining check here. It doesn't seem like he is inclined necessarily to get involved in this stuff. He's basically turned it over to Kennedy and let him run roughshod over it. Are you surprised at how much leeway Kennedy's been given here?

I'm a little bit surprised. And I want to emphasize a little bit surprised. I'm a little bit surprised because I think politically, this is not that solid ground for them. I mean, Kennedy's stuff plays really well with his supporters and parts of the MAGA base. But, you know, most people believe in vaccination. Most people don't like to hear, you know, that, you know, that the, you know, even if they are skeptical of the CDC, they don't like to hear that the agency that's guarding their health is being gutted. So this is, I think they feel, they can feel a little bit of the heat on this.

So, you know, it surprises me, given that, you know, they're politically sensitive enough that that might uh that's what i was sort of wondering right it's like at some point people want i mean want access to medications that they think they do they do they do the flip side right yeah you would think but i mean the the flip side is number one trump has always been sort of uh you know let's say uh endorsing some of the sort of you know uh he's anti There is, there you go, that's the phrase, anti-vax curious. I think there's the part of him that likes sort of being controversial. And, you know, look, let's face it, I think one of the checks on this,

when you were saying Trump is a check, I mean, Trump, the president's supposed to be a check, in part because we have a sort of basic notion, whatever your politics are, that the president in the United States is someone who's responsible, it's going to take big decisions seriously and try to weigh the evidence. They might be right or wrong or whatever. And that's just not what he does. I mean, has he, you know, he doesn't re-briefing papers. He doesn't, you know, spend any time thinking about these.

He's also not, he also has like three or four things that he is interested in, tariffs, interior decorating, you know, like things like that. In this case, redistricting right now. I don't think he really cares about the details around health policy. He doesn't. He doesn't. He's willing to put up. I want to read a little bit from Dimitri Daskalakis. This is resignation letter.

He posted it on Twitter, and I apologize for the viewers in advance because I'm going to read actually a fair chunk. The reason I'm going to read it, he wrote it to Dr. Howary, as you can see there, is because I don't think I've ever seen a resignation letter like this. It is, it's chilling, it's honest, it's scary. I'm just going to read parts. He writes, I've never experienced such razziness. non-transparency, nor have I seen such unskilled manipulation of data to achieve a political end rather than the good of the American people. You're seven months into the administration and no CDC subject matter expert from my center

has ever briefed the secretary, that's RFK Jr. He noticed that Kennedy at his hearing said that the Americans should not take medical advice from him. To the contrary, and appropriately briefed an 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 vacuit information. He goes on.

The intentional eroding of trust in low-risk vaccines favoring natural infection and unproven remedies will bring us to a pre-vaccine era where only the strong will survive and many, if not all, will suffer. And then there's the last thing that I want to talk about, which I think we haven't touched on yet,

but I think is actually a fairly big deal. He's referencing the recent CDC was shooting at the CDC headquarters in Atlanta. People don't remember this. this. Over 500 rounds were shot at the CDC headquarters on August 8th by eight gunmen who only killed, thank God, one person, an officer, but he had multiple, multiple windows at the CDC headquarters. And he was targeting public health officials, according to authorities, because he believed that the COVID vaccine was dangerous. So he was crazy. Dmitri writes,

the recent shooting at CDC is not why I'm resigning. My grandfather, who I am named after, stood up to fascist forces in Greece and lost his life doing so. I'm resigning to make him and his legacy proud. I'm resigning because of the cowardice of a leader that cannot admit that his and his minions' words over decades created an environment where violence like this can occur. I reject his and his colleagues' thoughts and prayers and advise they direct those to people that they have not actively harmed. The nation's health security is at risk and is in the hands of people focusing on ideological

self-interest. I'll stop there. I've never seen anything quite like that in a resignation letter, at least from someone that high up and that important to an agency. And it was shocking to read. Yeah. It's a remarkable letter. And for people watching, listening, just to give you a little background on who is coming from, Das Koloskis. This is somebody with, you know, experience going back to years he spent in the New York City Department of Health, very well regarded for his efforts on tuberculosis, on monkey pox, on HIV, someone with just reams of knowledge, years of experience, came to CDC, just incredibly well regarded. This is not somebody, you know, given to sort of, you know, idle speculation. So for him, and someone who, as he said, is given, you know, like most of the

people at CDC. You know, if you have the skill set to be a leader at CDC, you could be making a ton of money in the private sector. And he didn't. He's here at CDC serving the public as a career public servant. So, you know, somebody who, you know, for him to leave, this, you know, and why did he stay this long? Because he thought, like you were saying before, he thought he could fight the good fight from within and, you know, he wanted to do it. There was all kinds of, I mean, You know, the reporting in Dan's story in The Times, things we are hearing making clear he was fighting hard inside for the science. And he references that in his letter. And, you know, that part in the letter where he mentions, you know, there were recommendations going out that were never, no one never asked CDC scientists for input.

I mean, that is just mind-blowing. And I think entirely consistent with the story that is emerging that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who despite saying you shouldn't trust me because I'm not a doctor, nevertheless has made up his mind, has his ideas about vaccines, and he is going to get his way. And he is, that's the irony,

right? It's like he, Kennedy Jr. has always attacked people for being so rigid and non-open minded about, you know, science. His whole thing as well, you always have to question science.

You always have to question science. And yet here's a man who never has questioned his own preconceived notions, his own anti-scientific directions. He's not open to alternative viewpoints. He doesn't talk to people who challenge him. He, in fact, wants to impart his worldview on everyone else. And this letter from Dimitri is just, I thought that was the most chilling part. The fact that he spent seven months working and never once got a chance to talk to RFK Jr.

About the science. The person who I talked to that I referenced earlier said this, I cannot emphasize how bad it must be for these resignations to happen. I've not talked to. I'm blacking at this person's name because they don't want to fill the identity for a few months, but I know where his head was at. He was going to stay to protect science until he was asked to do something that could hurt people. The implication being he was asked to do something that could hurt people.

Also, Dan Diamond, who left us, has now tweeted and flagged for me, quote, hearing from that the White House has formally fired Monerese, per two administration's sources. Moner's lawyers, et cetera, and she had neither resigned nor been fired. I reached out to Mark Zaid to confirm that I have not heard back from Mark. Where does this leave us? I mean, how do they fill these positions? I assume they have people who agree with them on all sorts of stuff that they can

pluck, but I mean, where does this leave us? Well, that's exactly it. No scientist with any kind of integrity with any kind of who believes independent thinking is going to want this job, right? I mean, why would you want that? Because, I mean, it's been, the message has gone out. You're not there to provide input. You're not there to tell us what you think, what you think the evidence reads.

You are there to rubber stamp what Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wants. And by the way, what he wants is something that most really all, I would say, nearly all mainstream scientists reject. So who are they going to get for these positions? They're not going to be, let's just say they're not going to be getting the best people. And so again, I just want to, you know, let's go back to what CDC, does. This is our front line against disease, against, you know, for public health. And we're just, you know, we're, we're going to leave these posts either empty or filled with people who don't have the expertise, don't have the knowledge, and have some pretty out of, out of this

world views on what public health is. And, you know, this is, this is all of our health. This is all of us, you know. Yeah, it's not a, that's a thing. It's not a game. We have a measles outbreak in Texas. We have flu season coming up. We have, you know, the needs for COVID boosters coming up. This COVID virus is not gone. There's New York Times reasons that it's here. I mean, what are the expectations around like future moves from Kennedy? Obviously, everyone's kind of looking at the pediatric vaccine schedule and if he tinkers with that. But what do we have coming up that we should be watching out for? Yeah, well, we have that. We potentially have a looming decision. You know, we've referenced a little bit before on this sort of vaccine liability program.

which is this- I'll talk a little bit about that because it's a really good newslet he wrote. Yeah, yeah. So vaccines, you know, going, are protected, if, are protected against lawsuits through a traditional no-fault system where basically if you think you've been injured

by a vaccine and you can demonstrate that you have the injury, there's a payout. This system was created in the 1980s because we were getting shortages of vaccines because there were lawsuits against manufacturers. And a lot of these lawsuits, frankly, they were pretty tenuous. The cases, you know, the people said that, you know, these horrible things happened to people got shots, but it wasn't clear.

And in fact, frequently it was not because of the shots. And the manufacturers like, look, we're losing too much money on these. We're not going to make vaccines. So they created this system where basically you can get a payout. You can get compensated for your injury so you can pay your medical bills. And in exchange, the vaccine manufacturers don't have to worry about getting these lawsuits. And that's basically stabilized the vaccine. And he can just change and RFK Jr. can just change that. Just say, you know what? We're going to, we're going to make them liable to

any lawsuit out there. If someone thinks they've been injured by a vaccine, suddenly they can see the vaccine manufacturer and not to pay. So for most of the vaccines that are occurring in protection, like the measles vaccine, the MMR vaccines like that, the DTAP, he could change it. You have to do it through the regulatory process, assuming they want to follow the. normal procedures, which, you know, can take a few months, but they, you know, they could do it through the regulatory process. For COVID shots specifically, because for reasons that have to do with it being a public health emergency, because they're actually under a different liability shield. It kind of works the same way, but it's a different program. And that one, Kennedy can just sign a piece

of paper. That does not have to go through the whole regulatory process. So he can just release a letter tomorrow or next week or next month and say that the COVID vaccines are no longer covered under this liability shield. And I will say I was talking to someone about this day and it's quite possible it would be done in a slightly roundabout legal way that he wouldn't sound quite like that's what he was doing, but it would have the same effect. And if that happened, you know, you got to wonder, you're Moderna, your Pfizer, are you going to even bother selling these, you know, vaccines here because now you're going to be exposed. Everyone's going to think they, you know, all these lawsuits and they're going to go to court.

And your piece, you talked about how this existed in the 80s and they had to fix it. What was going on in the 80s? Yeah. So in the 80s, there was an older version of the pertussis vaccine, pertussis whooping cough, if you know what that is, which used to kill thousands of Americans every year. They introduced the vaccine, very painful. So you basically, you know, you basically asphyxiate. That's how you die.

I used to kill thousands of children every year. we introduced the vaccine, brought that down to like less than 10 a year. But there were side effects from it. There were known side effects. Most vaccines have some side effects, some worse than others. It's, you know, like any medicine, it can have side effects. It's true of almost, you know, pretty much any medical intervention. There were some stories suggesting some really catastrophic harms, brain damage, even some

deaths. Later research suggested that probably was not the case. But those lawsuits, those were the lawsuits that people started bringing against the manufacturers. And basically all the companies that were making this vaccine were like, you know what, we're not making a lot of money. We might be losing money on these. We can make a lot more money in other words. We're out.

And we had a situation where we had a shortage of pertussis vaccines. And it was actually pediatricians, among others, leading the charge to change and saying, like, we need these vaccines because we know as pediatricians, we know what it looks like. Well, that sort of, that brings me to this. Yeah, that brings me to sort of, I guess we can. and kind of close around here on this topic. But who we talked about checks. And I'll reveal who said it in our Slack,

but our colleague Bill Crystal, thinks that Trump will eventually reel in Kennedy because, as he argues, there's not much domestic political advantage here, he believes. And I kind of agree with that. But like I said, I don't really know if Trump gives a shit, to be honest. But there are other, I don't want to overstate,

state the significance of them because I think whatever. But the other places that can push back are, one, doctors, you know, pediatricians, for instance, can push back. But, you know, they have to be organized. They have to be willing to endure, push back from the administration. You know, there's risks involved, but they can. And patients obviously can do the same in moms who are worried about their kids and things like that. And I guess the other thing I want to just not totally dismisses the Hill. And it's possible that Cassidy finally gets a little spine and says, you know, what, we do need to actually hold the hearing on this.

And Paul RFK Jr. in front of it, and already have Bernie Sanders, who is the ranking member on the committee, say we need to do, or I think he is a ring member. It might not be. He wants a hearing involving Kennedy about what's going on here with the CBC. And then you have Senator Patty Murray, who I believe actually is the ranking member, who called for RFK Jr. tonight to be fired. over what happened here and praised, praise Monta's for standing up.

So I don't know, maybe I'm being a little bit optimistic that there can be some pushback. I certainly don't think it's going to be successful, but am I too optimistic here? It does seem like people will be very upset if they can't get access to vaccines for their kids or for themselves.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, look, you know, I'm Mr. Optimist. I'm always going to have. You are. If you're optimistic, I'm going to be, So part of me is inclined to say, yes, people will, you know, this, you know, it's hard to know nowadays what will break through. There's so much going on every day and will this, you know, pass in a day or two.

How do you do with the Cracker Barrel logo, John? Yeah, right. I'm so glad I missed that news cycle. I was writing my newslet. I completely missed that news cycle. Brain cells saved. And, you know, this is the kind of thing that shows up, right? I mean, there are going to be people, you know, we hear so much about people who don't like the COVID vaccine.

we forget. There's a lot of people who want the COVID vaccine. A lot of people are like, please, I don't want to get COVID. And if I get it, I don't want it to be severe. I don't want to go in the hospital. I don't want to maybe die. And so if it becomes unavailable or less available, I think people are going to notice that. And that will sort of kick something up. And you can imagine, you know, people on the hill reacting. So yes, I can imagine that. There is, on the other hand, I do feel a little there's a little Lucy in the football going here, you know, especially with Cassidy. You know, we kept, You know, Cassidy had so many chances, and he kind of stepped right up and it really was. It was loose.

You know, oh, no, I'm going to do it. I'm going to do it. And, you know, who knows? But you would think, I would like to think, when people, you know, doctors, and you were mentioning doctors being organized and there is a lot of some efforts going on. That's the thing called the Vaccine Integrity Project. They're putting out their own guidelines. The pediatricians had a really strong statement a week or two ago about COVID.

And actually Kennedy, like, fired back with his own tweet. Yeah, Kenny was pissed at them, right? He was super pissed. I have always been a big believer, though, that the most important persuasion that takes place is in small, one-on-one, small communication. And I think, you know, people, when they start hearing these things from their own doctor, and I think, you know, I mean, look, I know I'm sure you do too. I mean, I'm from both my work and the social circles.

I know lots of people who are doctors and have been upset about this for a while. But the reality is, like everyone else in America, who's not in our business like you and me, they got other stuff going on. And it's just, you know, at the end of the day, they're just, they're busy doing what they do, you know, you're not. Yeah, but when the flu season hits, yeah, this, this one I think, you know, I would not be surprised. And frankly, I hope doctors will be telling their patients or if they're asked by their patients, they will say, look, I think this is this is, this is what I believe. They don't need to be political about it. They don't need to be political school. this is what I've learned. And I hope, personally, I really do hope that maybe, you know,

remind people what the other side is. You know, this is, you know, the vaccine conversation, whenever you see Kennedy or any of these people talk about, it's like, there are these side effects. And, and they're exaggerating. And a lot of them are unreal and they're not there. They never talk about the other side is like, you ever seen a kid, you know, wheezing and suffocating and can't get breath because of whooping cough? You know, have you ever, you know, if you looked at, you know, a kid who they tried to deal with someone who has the measles or. It's just remarkable to me, right? It's like we are not that far removed from COVID.

We are not. Right, right, right. We are not that far removed from Operation Warb Speed, which was Trump's triumph. Yeah. Yeah. Which, by the way, that's the other piece of this. I do think that that's the only thing. You remember, I can't remember if this is when he were out, but like they asked him about

Kennedy issuing, you know, because this is when he pulled all the money for the MRNA vaccines. And they asked Trump at a White House. I was out. And he was kind of surprised. And I think the backstory here was kind of fuzzy, but like there wasn't great community. Again, on top of everything else, this is not the pro team when it comes to running a government agency. And there's not a lot of great communication going back and forth. And he's, you know, I mean, he's kind of gone anti-vax curious or whatever.

But he does like to take credit for warp speed as he should. I mean, that was a really successful program. So maybe that's a reason. And maybe that's another reason to have some optimist. I don't know, man. It's a bleak night. We're going to leave it there. I will say this is, when the story started breaking,

and I'm going to reveal it with Dan Diamond has now texted me, he actually was at the dentist when he heard about the story and confirmed it while he's getting his teeth worked on. He was going to tell that story in the last year, but we can get to it. When this started breaking, I started hearing about it, not through Dan, but through a source of my own. It seemed surreal because it's worth noting Moner's was only there for a couple weeks.

And then it became like very much not more than surreal became a real panic when you saw that there was actually four five top officials who were not stepping down real people with integrity and leadership and scientific knowledge and institutional and they're just gone and we are in an incredibly uncharted very dark place when it comes to our nation's health and it's scary. Jonathan, thank you so much for doing this. I appreciate it. I look forward to seeing what else you can unearth around the reporting around this. And for those who jumped on with us tonight for this live stream, thank you for doing this. I've been wanting to do more of these. Usually we wait to some big event to happen.

Unfortunately, in this case, it's a really bad event. But we are here to walk you through it. Leave comments about how we can improve this experience. And we'll talk to you soon. Take care, guys.