Rand Paul: CDC Officials Fired For “Not Following the Science”

The Senate held a fiery hearing titled “Restoring Trust Through Radical Transparency” with ousted CDC Director Susan Monarez as a witness. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy was not invited to speak at the hearing. Senator Bill Cassidy said Kennedy’s explanation for removing Monarez was due to “conflicts of interest, catastrophically bad judgment, and political agendas.” Cassidy asked if the Senate had missed something by approving her nomination in the first place.

Monarez said the explanations for her dismissal are not accurate, including the claim that she was not aligned with administration priorities or that she is untrustworthy.

​​“On the morning of August 25th, Secretary Kennedy demanded two things of me that were inconsistent with my oath of office and the ethics required of a public official,” Monarez said. “He directed me to commit in advance to approving ACIP recommendations, regardless of the scientific evidence. He also directed me to dismiss career officials responsible for vaccine policy without cause. I responded that I could not pre-approve recommendations without reviewing the evidence, and I had no basis to fire scientific experts. He told me he had already spoken with the White House several times about having me removed.”

Senator Rand Paul dismissed Monarez’s characterization of events and that she and others were fired for requesting the scientific evidence. “They were fired for NOT following the Science,” Senator Paul wrote on X after the conclusion of the hearing. “There is NO science for giving newborns HepB when the mother is negative. There is NO science for mandating 6-month-olds to get COVID vaccines. Secretary Kennedy is doing important work to make our vaccine schedule make sense and follow science, and he should be applauded for it.”

Senator Richard Blumenthal defended the HepB vaccine, stating that 300,000 Americans were infected each year, including nearly 20,000 children, before the vaccine was approved in the 1980s. The HighWire has reported that the safety licensure trials for the HepB vaccine had a five-day safety review period after inoculation.

ICAN lead attorney Aaron Siri wrote on X during the hearing, “The Hep B data just shared is not accurate and doesn’t in any way explain why we give a Hep B vaccine to a one-day-old baby to a non-Hep B positive mother. More misleading information.”

“This hearing is not about restoring public trust,” Siri wrote. “It is about trying to attack Secretary Kennedy, who is seeking to upend massive financial interests and dogmatic medical advice that have overseen the decline in the health of children: from under 10% of children in the 1980s having a chronic disease to over 50% of children today. Addressing that crisis and the harms caused by vaccines are essential to restoring public trust. This hearing is seeking to keep the status quo of widespread chronic disease and failing to address vaccine safety, which will only serve to further erode public trust.”

Senator Paul asked Monarez several questions about the science supporting the vaccine recommendations. He asked whether the COVID-19 vaccine reduces hospitalization for children under 18. Monarez responded, “It can,” to which Senator Paul said, “It doesn’t,” and explained there is no way to tell because the number of hospitalizations and deaths in this age group is extraordinarily small.

Monarez also said the COVID-19 vaccine “can” reduce deaths for this age group. Senator Paul said this is a ridiculous answer, that it doesn’t reduce deaths, and there is no statistical significance to prove this claim.

“The whole recommendation for having a COVID vaccine for 6 months up is not based on hospitalization data, not based on deaths, it’s based on whether you make antibodies or not,” Senator Paul said. “What people fail to see from this is – I can inject you with a foreign protein every week and measure antibodies, and you’ll make antibodies every time. It has nothing to do with whether you should get a vaccine every week.”

Senator Paul explained that there is no scientific reason for giving COVID-19 vaccines to children who are as young as 6 months of age because the death and hospitalization numbers are so small. He elaborated by describing the “significant” risks of myocarditis in this population at between six and eight for every 10,000 doses.

Senator Paul went on to challenge Monarez for refusing to fire individuals in the CDC who back the claim that children as young as 6 months should be receiving the COVID-19 vaccine despite having no scientific evidence that the benefit is greater than the risk associated with the product for this age group. Senator Paul said people cling to the idea of not changing the childhood vaccine schedule, but said that it is the duty of the federal health agency officials to make changes if the science doesn’t support the recommendations.

“You want to make all the kids take this,” Senator Paul said to Monarez. “The burden is upon you and the people you wouldn’t fire to prove to us that we need to give our 6-month-old a COVID vaccine and that we need to give our one-day-old the Hepatitis B vaccine. That’s what the debate ought to be about, not whether all vaccines are good or whether we live in Alice in Wonderland.”

Monarez said she agrees with Senator Paul, but she wouldn’t “pre-commit to approving all of the ACIP recommendations without the science.” Senator Paul said that it is “untrue.”

“Let me make it simple: Susan Monarez is a vaccine fanatic who deceived her way into the position by pretending to care about vaccine safety,” Siri wrote on X. “She took advantage of Secretary Kennedy’s trust. But even putting that aside, she has no business running the CDC because her vaccine knowledge consists of dogma, mantras, and slogans. That has also been reaffirmed in this hearing thus far.”

This hearing comes just over a week after a different Senate hearing in which an unpublished retrospective study comparing health outcomes between vaccinated and unvaccinated children was reviewed. In that hearing, Siri explained the results of the 2020 study and the alleged reasons Dr. Marcus Zervos and Henry Ford Health did not release the study.

The study was not peer-reviewed or published, but Siri explained that it is a robust study relying on real-world data, unlike the studies that are referenced to prove vaccine safety. The study reveals that vaccinated children were more than five times more likely to develop autoimmune diseases and neurodevelopmental disorders.