PREPARED REMARKS: Sanders Opening Statement in Oversight Hearing for Fired CDC Director

WASHINGTON, Sept. 17 - Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), today delivered an opening statement at the committee's oversight hearing on the Trump administration's decision to fire Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Dr. Susan Monarez and oust senior scientists.

Sanders' remarks, as prepared for delivery, are below:

On July 31, Dr. Monarez was sworn in as our nation's first Senate-confirmed Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

At her swearing-in ceremony, Secretary Kennedy said: "Dr. Monarez is a public health expert with unimpeachable scientific credentials. I have full confidence in her ability to restore the CDC's role as the most trusted authority in public health and to strengthen our nation's readiness to confront infectious diseases and biosecurity threats."

That was what Secretary Kennedy said on July 31.

On August 27, less than a month later, Dr. Monarez was fired.
Why was that? Well, according to Secretary Kennedy, Dr. Monarez, who has spent nearly two decades as a public servant working in both Democratic and Republican administrations, is "a liar" and "untrustworthy."

Really? How did Dr. Monarez go from being "a public health expert with unimpeachable scientific credentials" who had the "full confidence" of Secretary Kennedy into being a "liar" and "untrustworthy" in less than a month? That is quite a transformation.

Well, I think the answer is pretty obvious.

Dr. Monarez was fired because she refused to act as a rubber stamp to implement Secretary Kennedy's dangerous agenda to substantially limit the use of safe and effective vaccines that would endanger the lives of the American people and people throughout the world.

Specifically, she was fired for two reasons:

Number 1: She refused to "preapprove" the "recommendations of a vaccine advisory panel newly filled with people who have publicly expressed antivaccine rhetoric."

In other words, she took the radical position that she wanted to examine the scientific facts before drawing conclusions. I would hope that is the very least that we could expect from any public health official in the United States.

And Number 2: She refused to fire career scientists for doing their job, including Dr. Houry, who was then the Chief Medical Officer at the CDC.

Bottom line: Dr. Monarez stood up for science, for public health and for the scientific method. Frankly, she stood up for protecting the well-being of the American people. And for that reason, she was fired.

But, Mr. Chairman, let us be clear. This hearing is not just about determining why Dr. Monarez was fired and why Dr. Houry and other scientists at the CDC resigned.

The issue is deeper than that. It is about Kennedy's dangerous war on science, public health and the truth itself.

Unacceptably, we now have an HHS Secretary who does not believe in established science and who listens to conspiracy theorists and ideologues instead of doctors and medical professionals.

It is absurd to have to say this in the year 2025, but vaccines are safe and effective. That, of course, is not just my view. Far more important, it is the overwhelming consensus of the medical and scientific communities.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, the country's largest professional association of pediatricians, representing over 67,000 doctors - those are the doctors we take our kids to - what do they say?

They say that "one of the greatest public health achievements" is the vaccine, which prevents tens of thousands of deaths and millions of cases of disease. That's our pediatricians.

The American Medical Association, representing over 270,000 doctors. They say that vaccines are "the best tools to protect the public against these illnesses and their potentially serious complications."

The World Health Organization, virtually every medical organization, every science organization, the people who we trust tell us that vaccines are safe and effective.

Mr. Chairman, you will recall several years ago, when I sat where you sit, you will recall when we had the heads of major agencies talking about pandemic preparedness, and we all asked them: "You tell me, will there be another pandemic in the future." And they all said, well, no one knows what it will be, no one knows when it will come, but the likelihood is there will be another pandemic.

And the next question that some of us asked was: "Tell us, are we prepared for that terrible event." Without exception, Mr. Chairman, you will recall they all said that we're not prepared.

What's going on now is not just endangering the health and well-being of our children. Are we prepared for the next pandemic, which could claim millions of lives? Are we doing the scientific research to develop the vaccines and other tools that we need?

That is what frightens me.

• Print
• Email
• Share
• Tweet