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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt

Now: Growing GOP Concern With RFK Jr. As Health Secretary; RFK Jr. Rejects Criticism & Health Data In Contentious Hearing; New: First Lady Hosts Task Force Meeting On A.I. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired September 04, 2025 - 16:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[16:00:01]

ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: As for Dude Wipes, they added, quote, "Love a clean tush push". Match made in heaven.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Yeah. The play, which is used in short yardage situations in which a player shoves a teammate from behind, survived a proposed ban during the offseason.

Now the Eagles, who have mastered the move, hope to tout this deal in the season ahead with social media collaborations and more.

HILL: Shocking.

SANCHEZ: I hope it fails. I hope they don't repeat. I'm cheering for the Miami Dolphins all the way, even though I know it's not going to happen.

HILL: Well, you know, you know, seasons young. You can always dream.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. Dreams.

Hey, thanks for joining us.

THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT starts right now.

(MUSIC)

KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: Hi, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. Welcome to THE ARENA. It's wonderful to have you with us on this Thursday.

As we come on the air, a vital debate over the very future of public health in America, playing out all day today, live on television.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MICHAEL BENNET (D-CO): After firing the entire --

ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR., HHS SECRETARY: You're evading the question.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're interrupting me. And, sir, you're a charlatan. That's what you are.

KENNEDY: Making things up to scare people. And it's a lie. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So let me ask you. When were you lying, sir?

KENNEDY: I don't even know what you're talking about. You're talking gibberish.

SEN. RAPHAEL WARNOCK (D-GA): You are a hazard to the health of the American people.

KENNEDY: Can I respond?

WARNOCK: No, I'm -- I claim back my time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: So that was some of the theater that we saw today. But it all really does underscore the substance of what RFK, Jr. is actually doing as the top health administrator in our nation's government. He is putting his own thoughts and feelings about the science. And remember, he's not a lawyer -- he is a lawyer. He is not a scientist or a doctor.

He is putting those thoughts and feelings over the data that actual scientists are bringing to the public. Here he was today, talking at various points throughout this hearing about scientists and doctors lying to you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. RON WYDEN (D-OR): So she's lying today to the American people in "The Wall Street Journal".

KENNEDY: Yes, sir.

WYDEN: American Academy of Pediatrics, you think they're lying, too?

KENNEDY: I think the American Academy of Pediatrics is gravely conflicted.

Senator. I mean, we were lied to about everything. We are being lied to by these agencies, and were going to change that right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: So it was interesting to hear Kennedy claim that so many people, people who have dedicated their lives to try to keep other people healthy and well, that those people are lying to you when, as we know so plainly, RFK, Jr. himself seems to have no issue with lying to you about what he himself has said in the past.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Over the summer, in an interview, you said, quote, there's no vaccine that is, you know, safe and effective. Do you still believe that?

KENNEDY: I never said that. HUNT: So stop me. We have the clip. Please play the clip.

KENNEDY: I think some of the live virus vaccines are probably saw -- averting more problems than they're causing. There's no vaccine that is, you know, safe and effective.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: I never said that, he says. And yet he was clearly lying about that.

Let's get off the sidelines. Let's head into THE ARENA.

My panel is here, but we do want to get first right to CNN chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, who, of course, is a doctor and would never lie to you.

And, Dr. Gupta, you were watching this hearing right along with the rest of America.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah.

HUNT: And honestly, you've -- you've seen such an arc of our public health experience. You are a doctor yourself. You understand the science. You understand the data.

You also understand how to communicate with people and what makes them trust you and what makes them doesn't trust, not -- not trust you. What impact do you think this hearing today had on all of our health?

GUPTA: This was infuriating, to be quite honest, anxiety provoking as well. And mostly useless. I think the American people would walk away from this far more confused at the end of three hours than they were at the beginning.

And, you know, you're dealing with some of the most powerful people in the world. I mean, the secretary of health, he is essentially the CEO of the largest health enterprise in the world, responsible for, obviously, close to a $2 trillion budget. But also millions, 100 million people, roughly insurance, you know, budgets for research, for scientific discovery.

And I don't think people know what to believe. You know, at some point, it was clear that he was saying COVID vaccines were more dangerous than COVID itself. I think he said something similar about antidepressants in the form of SSRIs. People aren't sure if they should get a vaccine, if they can get a vaccine.

I was -- I was shocked.

[16:05:00]

I've been doing this job for a long time, Kasie, 25 years. That was the most scattered, vitriolic and frankly, again, useless sort of, you know, aggregation of thoughts I think, that I've ever seen.

HUNT: Really remarkable when you put it that way. Again, having seen as much as you have.

And, Sanjay, can you help us understand a little bit of like the actual implications here? Because, look, there's a lot of government, there's a lot of things we talk about on this set when we talk about politics, that real people are all people being real, but that people back home, they don't necessarily think it matters to them, and maybe it doesn't, right? Maybe it matters more here.

But this seems to have a very real world impact. When you have a baby, you take your child to the doctor. What does that doctor tell you about what shots they should have? What -- you know, what they may be exposed to?

Can you help us understand? Especially the vaccine piece of this? What we heard from RFK today. Are more kids going to get sick because he's in charge?

GUPTA: I worry that that's the case. I mean, you know, I think it's going to be interesting to see when you look at what's happening in states like Florida, for example, which is taking their cues from, I think RFK. They're not going to recommend or mandate vaccines anymore for, for kids to go to school, something that's been around since the early '80s.

I think what's going to be interesting to see is do parents then not vaccinate their kids more? Theres already been exemptions in place, Kasie, as you may well know. So people could exempt from vaccines for personal religious reasons. And typically, the percentage of parents who do that is very low single digits. You know, 1, 2, 3 percent roughly around the country, depending on state.

Eighty percent, roughly, of parents now -- right now, were talking about still think vaccine mandates for their school age children are important. So will people continue to get their kids vaccinated despite all the stuff that they're hearing here, despite the fact that the HHS secretary is casting some real doubt when he says, look, none of these vaccines have been tested. When he said what he said to you in December of 2023, that none are safe and effective.

If you're a new parent, you'd be rightly confused. And I think that that's -- that's the tragedy of all of it. Hopefully, common sense prevails and people actually trust, you know, what they -- what they think is true. But we'll see.

I think a lot of -- a lot of distrust out there. A third of the country has heard the message at some point this year that the measles vaccine is more dangerous than measles itself. Third of the country has heard that.

That is the type of mis -- that's false. Absolutely false. And yet that is the information that's getting out there over and over again. And, you know, for some people, that will stick.

HUNT: Yeah. Just stunning. I mean, and I -- when I have friends, I have a parent of young children, the practices, the pediatricians here in Washington, D.C., which is, you know, a, a blue and cosmopolitan city will ask you, are you willing to commit to this vaccine schedule? Because if you're not, we're not the practice for you. I was blown away that they had to ask us that.

But, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

GUPTA: Of course. Thank you.

HUNT: All right. Let's play a little bit more of what Secretary Kennedy said about the COVID-19 pandemic during today's hearing. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MARK WARNER (D-VA): Do you think the vaccine did anything to prevent additional deaths?

KENNEDY: Again, I would like to see the data and talk about the data.

WARNER: You have had this job for eight months and you don't know the data? Secretary of health and human services doesn't know how many Americans died from COVID.

KENNEDY: No --

WARNER: Doesn't know if the vaccine helped prevent any deaths. And you are sitting as secretary of health and human services, how can you be that ignorant?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Joining us now, the man you heard right there, questioning Kennedy, Democratic Senator Mark Warner of Virginia.

Senator, thank you very much for being with us. I think you may have been listening there in our conversation with Dr. Sanjay Gupta, who, of course, has been doing the job he's been doing, as he pointed out, for 25 years. You heard his assessment of the hearing. What's your reaction to that? And do you think that because Secretary Kennedy is in charge, more kids are going to get sick in America?

WARNER: Absolutely, yes. I mean, I'm old enough to remember, you know, polio, mumps, rubella. I mean, Senator Cantwell had a great graph of how many people were died from these, you know, not 100 years ago, somewhat in my lifetime, in the '50s and '60s. And what vaccines have done.

The fact that this is being relitigated right now, I know vast parts of the world in Asia, Africa, South America would love to get all these vaccines because they want their kids to be safe. And it's kind of mind boggling, Kasie.

And the fact that, you know, what I know about -- listen, I thought Kennedy might bring some efforts around. You know, healthiness. You know, I know he's talked about seed oil and changing the color in Skittles. [16:10:03]

But that shouldn't be top priority when he's, you know, basically undermining science, undermining research, cutting back on vaccines. And I thought my question was pretty basic. If you're the secretary of health, shouldn't you know how many Americans died from COVID? And did the vaccine help prevent deaths? He couldn't answer that. It's baffling.

HUNT: Yeah, the exchange was fairly clear there.

You mentioned the color in Skittles and the other things. And there are obviously elements to the MAHA movement, Make America Healthy Again, where there clearly are a lot of Americans who, perhaps rightfully don't trust companies to keep them safe. Right? Who feel that there are things in food, there are things in farming or other places that are making them sick.

What do you say to those Americans about all of this? And how do you pull that apart from the vaccine piece of this?

WARNER: Well, I'd say I get it. I got two kids that are in their 30s. Two of my three kids have got a chronic illnesses. The incidence is much higher.

And, you know, I thought it was interesting. It seemed like Kennedy kind of punted on the whole pesticide question -- pesticide question with big ag. He didn't -- he didn't really take on that at all.

And one of the things that I think the MAHA movement, particularly MAHA moms, I wish we'd hear from Kennedy something about, well, what about the cleanliness of our drinking water? What about the quality of the air we're breathing?

Those are real health hazards as well. And this administration is, you know, rolling back bipartisan environmental rules that have been in place for 30, 40 years. Why isn't the MAHA movement -- why isn't Kennedy talking about this?

We ought to talk about the whole system we live in, in terms of health. I've been freaked out about some of the recent data about these tiny particles of plastic that are in plastic bottles. I think having a science-based approach that we think about things in terms of how they affect our health. Sign me up.

But randomly going after, you know, vaccines willy-nilly and not really looking at, you know, all of the health factors is not what I thought we were going to get. I was actually hoping he might surprise us and be actually health focused. He seems to have picked a few of these items that clearly he's had litigation efforts and his prior experience he focused on. But a comprehensive approach. And I don't know how you do comprehensive health without looking at air, water and other things that we intersect with as well as recognizing it.

End of the day, if you refute basic science, you -- kids are going to get sick and not just kids. One of the questions you ought to ask everybody goes on. All right, senator or congressman, why are you getting a COVID vaccine?

HUNT: Fair enough. Senator Mark Warner, very grateful to have you on the show today, sir. Thanks for being here.

WARNER: Thank you, Kasie. Thanks so much.

HUNT: Soon, I hope.

Coming up next, our panel here to weigh in on everything we heard today, where we go from here.

Plus, Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin will be right here, live in THE ARENA as some lawmakers in his own party are starting to show some unease about the leadership of RFK, Jr.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): Give me the science. Cut all this crap of responding to whatever talking head you think you need to please because you want to score points on the Internet. Get the science done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:18:01]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TILLIS: Does anybody really believe that you studied to be a PhD in epidemiology, and they came to go to the CDC so they could lie about science? I mean, it's just illogical to me. America's health is at risk. We're playing with fire here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Republican Senator Thom Tillis seeming to crank up the heat on Health Secretary RFK, Jr. earlier today on Capitol Hill. Tillis, of course, happens to not be running for reelection. He's got a little bit more room to break with President Trump, but he is not the only Republican who's openly questioning RFK's MAHA agenda, especially the vaccine piece of it.

Chief congressional correspondent Manu Raju joins us now.

Manu, I know you've been chasing Republicans through the halls. What have you picked up from them in terms of how RFK performed today?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, a lot of unease about his stewardship at the head of HHS and just, frankly, a lot of Republican senators sidestepping questions about whether they fully support him staying in the position. And Thom Tillis himself, I asked him after that exchange, I said, do you regret your vote to confirm RFK, Jr.? He said, quote, "Not yet". He said he wants some key information from RFK, Jr. about how he's getting some -- of making some of his decisions.

And he also said the information that's coming out, the rhetoric that's coming out of HHS is, quote, dangerous to voters, to Americans who may not have access to quality information about vaccines.

But he's hardly the only one who has raising some concerns or showing some significant unease. The top Republican in the Senate, the Senate majority leader, John Thune. I asked him directly, do you have confidence in RFK, Jr. as HHS secretary? And he just simply would not say he said it's not exactly what I think. It's what the president ultimately thinks. He's the president is the one who has confidence, making it clear he wouldn't say.

And Bill Cassidy, too, who played the central role in getting him confirmed a pivotal vote, a medical doctor and got assurances from RFK, Jr. about vaccines, that he would not restrict access to vaccines, simply said, I will let my exchange speak for itself.

[16:20:13]

That exchange today was quite fiery between Cassidy and RFK, Jr., about Kennedys rolling back of vaccines for COVID-19. So, it shows you right there how Republicans view all of this. One of them, to, Senator Susan Collins of Maine, up for reelection, also cast a key vote for Kennedy, will not answer questions about Kennedy and her support for him as she left for the week -- Kasie.

HUNT: No surprise there. Manu Raju, thanks very much for that reporting. Really appreciate it.

All right. Our panel is here, CNN contributor, "New York Times" journalist, podcast host, Lulu Garcia-Navarro; the host of "The Chuck Toddcast", Chuck Todd; Democratic strategist Adrienne Elrod and CNN political commentator, Republican strategist Shermichael Singleton.

Thank you all for being here.

Chuck, what a morning here in Washington. Pretty -- you know, Manu laid it out there, right, that people are not -- Republicans are not interested in falling over themselves to defend what we saw from RFK, Jr. today. And the bottom line here, not everything here in Washington really affects every family at home in their daily lives. But this sure does.

CHUCK TODD, HOST OF "THE CHUCK TODDCAST": It does. You know, the right likes to dunk on Democrats sometimes when they're on the wrong side of an 80-20 issue, right? And sometimes some of those criticisms are correct. When it came to -- when it comes to some of these conversations about law and order and culture and stuff like this. This is an 80-20 issue.

HUNT: Vaccine.

TODD: How do you know it's an 80-20 issue? Because you have John Thune, John Barrasso. These are people who never want to be seen as going against Trump in any way. It was clever the way both Cassidy and Barrasso, you know, in order to criticize Kennedy, they had to praise the president.

HUNT: Wasn't the president's vaccine program is so great.

TODD: Nobel Peace Prize, right, amazing --

HUNT: Nobel Peace Prize for it, yes.

TODD: Almost like please drive a wedge. Get this done. Look, this is -- this is beyond disastrous. He is easily the most unqualified cabinet secretary we've ever had. And we've had plenty of unqualified cabinet secretaries in a number of places, in a number of agencies.

This one is putting lives in danger. Within eight months now, we have multiple states deciding to start their own vaccine protocols, their own, you know, feeling as if they can't trust the CDC. This is why the White House -- and here's the thing. There are people at the White House who have been alarmed by Kennedy, and it's Trump that says, you know, he's afraid of losing the Kennedy constituency, and he's just been letting Kennedy go, letting Kennedy go.

At some point, this will break. And I do think he throws Kennedy overboard. But, you know, he loves his trophy. And for him, the trophy is I got a Kennedy, right? And it is -- it is -- that's the biggest problem they're running into.

There are plenty of people in this White House that know this guy is a disaster, not just politically. This guy is a disaster for all the reasons we've been laying out here.

HUNT: Well, and, Lulu, I mean, the health official, we played that that sequence of Kennedy basically saying that, yes, these scientists and health officials are lying to us.

One of the people he said was lying is Susan Monarez, the former head of the CDC, who wrote in "The Journal", "I was told to pre-approve the recommendation of a vaccine advisory panel newly filled with people who have publicly expressed anti-vaccine rhetoric. Once trusted experts are removed, advisory bodies are stacked. The results are predetermined. This isn't reform. It is sabotage."

So, then Kennedy calls her a liar, says that she wasn't told to pre- approve these recommendations. Here's what her attorneys say.

Quote, "We certainly dismissed Senator Kennedys claims as false and at times patently ridiculous. Dr. Monarez stands by what she said in her 'Wall Street Journal' op-ed and continues to support the vision she outlined at her confirmation hearing that science will control her decisions."

What are the stakes here?

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: The stakes are that we are rapidly descending into a country where, no one can trust even basic things like when you get your kids to be vaccinated. And I'm from the, you know, Florida is my home state, and I can tell you that there are parents there who are terrified because what does this mean? We vaccinate everyone to protect the most vulnerable among us.

That means children under two months old who cannot be vaccinated. That means children who might be allergic to vaccines because they have a medical condition. That means vulnerable adults. We do that for ourselves, but also for the greater good of everyone around us.

HUNT: That's what's called public health.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: That's why it's called public health.

HUNT: Yeah.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And that is accepted everywhere in the world, apparently, except at this Senate hearing.

HUNT: So, Shermichael Singleton, you're a new parent.

SHERMICHAEL SINGLETON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I am.

HUNT: A lot of parents at the at the table, right? Obviously, the really the bottom line question here is can Americans trust the leadership of these organizations that tell them, hey, you might not know how to read the scientific paper, you may not have done this study, but we can tell you that giving your child this vaccine will make them safer, because it will prevent this disease that they might otherwise get and that it's not going to hurt them.

[16:25:13]

And you saw the data that Dr. Gupta put up there that says all these people have heard 30, like 33 percent have heard incredibly damaging misinformation about the MMR vaccine.

SINGLETON: I think they can. I was looking at an NIH study that came out 2 or 3 years ago. And the data was very interesting.

When they asked people if they trusted doctors writ large, I think it dropped down like 40 percent. But when they asked, do you trust your personal doctor? It was like 70 or 80 percent.

And so, I think this thing with RFK is somewhat analogous of maybe where some in the country are moving in terms of skepticism, but I'm not worried because the NIH studies still show that most people are saying, look, I trust my personal doctor. If my personal doctor is advising me to do certain things for my personal health or the health of my kids, people are still listening to that. And I think that's really, really important.

And so, despite how interesting this hearing was, I think most Americans are saying, look, maybe I have questions about things, I'm not exactly sure, I'm not a doctor, but I know if my personal physician is telling me to do something for my health or the health of my family, I'm going to listen. To me, Kasie, that's a good thing.

HUNT: There are all kinds of people who do trust -- there's a reason why they call themselves MAHA moms. SINGLETON: Yeah, look, I don't know if that's representative of the

majority of people in the country.

HUNT: Well, I mean, our polling shows that it's not, but it's growing.

SINGLETON: Even people who are skeptical, though, at least at this point, are still saying, as it pertains to their personal relationships with their personal physician, they trust that individual. And to me, that is a very good sign, because what it's telling me is that people may again be skeptical of certain things writ large. Maybe you look at opioids, if you're a person of color and you're from the South, you can go back 60, 70 years and remember those experiences.

But as it pertains to individual experiences with a personal physician, people saying, "I trust that person," that gives me a lot of hope about where we're moving.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Kasie, this is wildly irresponsible, though, is the problem, because we might all like and trust our doctors, but this is the secretary of health and human services who has just gone out on television and told senators that he does not trust the science that is settled science. He does not trust the scientists in his own administration. He does not trust scientists and science writ large.

And so what are people to believe? They take their cues from our leaders. They take their cues from the people who are supposed to know these things and are supposed to protect us. And if those people are basically lying in public, that unfortunately has massive repercussions.

SINGLETON: I'm skeptical if people are taking their cues from RFK. I got to be honest, as a parent --

GARCIA-NAVARRO: But, Shermichael --

SINGLETON: -- I'm not taking my cues from RFK. Most of my friends who are parents aren't either.

(CROSSTALK)

ADRIENNE ELROD, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: You may not have to take your cues from him, but he is the secretary of health and human services, and he is an anti-vaxxer. He is very skeptical.

That is the point here that I think we have to realize that, yes, you're -- if you're a parent, you can make your own decisions about how you want to vaccinate your kids. But when the person who is in charge of Americas health care system is an anti-vaxxer and is perpetuating misinformation, disinformation, you know, lied during his confirmation hearings, I think it was -- you know, I'm glad that Cassidy and Barrasso pushed back on him today. But, you know, they voted for him.

And I think we had a lot of concerns. When you have two medical professionals, two doctors in the Republican-controlled Senate who voted for him. So, it was just -- I think I understand where you're coming from, but there's a giant difference between making your own decisions for your families and then having somebody who is ruling America's health care system, who is an anti-vaxxer.

TODD: You know, the folks over at you know, here's the thing. He alone is responsible for something like 75 percent of the misinformation that's out there. Part of his -- this children's defense, whatever it's called, Children's Health Defense, I think he calls it, CHD, this nonprofit group that he was a part of. It was sort of his, his political part of his sort of nonprofit wing, of his political committees.

I think it's called NewsGuard. They did a study of this. And, and I know, I mean, Kennedy himself in this organization is responsible for some -- some gigantic amount of misinformation. You know, this is -- and this is where unfortunately, this is the culmination of what happens when you have an irresponsible big tech community with ridiculous algorithms that creates this situation that were in to.

This misinformation is out there because of how much it floods into people's lives. If you're in the health and wellness, you know you're just going to see, hey, what's the better organic fruit that I should be eating? And you and you get this, this crazy misinformation largely coming from these groups that Kennedy founded.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And ultimately, let's put this into the context that matters, which is he controls how the recommendations of vaccines, the approval of what gets actually approved. And so that actually -- insurance companies, what insurance companies will pay for.

[16:30:02]

So in fact, in many places right now, they can't get the COVID vaccine, D.C. being among them because of some of the actions that are being taken right now by HHS.

So, you know, this isn't theoretical. This isn't like when he was running for president. And you can just dismiss it. This is actually affecting everyone.

TODD: Bill Cassidy made this point. Erick Erickson's wife, who's got cancer, could not get a COVID vaccine at CVS in Georgia.

HUNT: And to your point, we actually do have that map. We'll put it up at some point later on in the program. Unfortunately, we're up against the clock.

Coming up next here, Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin is here live in THE ARENA. We'll get his reaction to RFK, Jr.'s testimony today.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:35:04]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SEN. JOHN BARRASSO (R-WY): Secretary Kennedy, in your confirmation hearing, you promised to uphold the highest standards for vaccines. Since then, I've grown deeply concerned. The public has seen measles outbreaks. Leadership in the National Institute of Health questioning the use of mRNA vaccines, the recently confirmed director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention fired. Americans don't know who to rely on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: That was Senator John Barrasso. He's a Republican senate leader and a doctor, and he's one of a few senate Republicans who expressed concern or skepticism today over the Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.'s policies.

Vice President Vance, weighing in after the hearing with this message of support, apparently for the health secretary, he wrote this, quote, "All these senators trying to lecture and gotcha Bobby Kennedy are, quote, full of S-H-I-T".

Joining me now is Republican senator from Oklahoma, Markwayne Mullin. He sits on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, among others.

Senator, thanks very much for being here. Appreciate it.

SEN. MARKWAYNE MULLIN (R-OK): Absolutely. Thanks for having me on.

HUNT: Senator Barrasso there was very clear. He says he's concerned about the public's health because of what Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has done with the health agencies.

Do you share his concern?

MULLIN: Well, I think he's concerned about the American people's health as a whole. I mean, if you go back to when CDC was stood up, which was 1946, July 1st, 1946, which would have been 79 years ago, we -- there was only 3 percent of the country that was had chronic illness. Today,, we're over 76 percent.

Senator Barrasso is a doctor. He's questioning science, which used to -- it was okay to question science. Now, you can't. To even question Bobby Kennedy and say, hey, are we sure were moving in the right direction?

There's nothing wrong with asking questions. It's when you start accusing him of being unethical, or you're starting accusing him of sabotaging. You start accusing him of being an anti-vaxxer or something like that.

But to question science, all Senator Barrasso was doing was questioning science. And he's a doctor, and he should do that.

HUNT: You're saying that Barrasso there was questioning science. I mean, I heard him -- MULLIN: He's questioning the statistics as a whole. I mean, why are

we -- why are we the sickest nation in the world? Kasie, we should be asking that question. What is wrong with saying, okay, if in 1950, we were at 3 percent chronic illness, today, we're at 76, and 1950 -- or 1950, we're one of the healthiest nations. Today, we're the -- we're the sickest nation in the world.

Where is -- where has CDC succeeded because the definition of insanity is doing the same thing, expecting different results. What Bobby is doing, Secretary Kennedy is doing is he's going in there and he's questioning things, saying, hey, we need to look at every aspect. There isn't anything that should be looked at.

It just because it's science and we think it's proven science. Science is always changing.

HUNT: So I want to pull apart. I take your point about chronic diseases, and its very clear that there are a lot of Americans in the world that are concerned about things like food dyes and pesticides and all the things.

MULLIN: Let's talk about autism. I mean, autism is running rampant.

HUNT: So I want to pull all of that chronic stuff apart from trust in vaccines, because if the kids at my kids school don't get vaccinated for the measles, the chances that my kid is going to get measles go up, right?

So that affects all of us. And it was very clear today that we saw Secretary Kennedy questioning these vaccines. That was the heart of what Barrasso was saying, was the heart of what other Republicans have been focused on.

Do you think Secretary Kennedy is in the right place on vaccines?

MULLIN: I absolutely do. By questioning vaccines, without question. I'm a father of six. All my kids are vaccinated.

But it did question it. When you start looking at statistics, what was it, 1 in 10,000 kids, when we first started tracking autism, had -- it was diagnosed with -- was as autistic. Today, it's 1 in 10 and in some numbers are less.

HUNT: Why are you linking that to vaccines?

MULLIN: I'm not. I'm saying why wouldn't we look at it? What's changed? What we do is look --

HUNT: We have looked at it, and there has been -- we have that --

MULLIN: So we should look at it again.

HUNT: And there have not there -- the study showed there was no connection between the MMR vaccine and autism. There was a retracted study. MULLIN: Well, there's different -- there's different than -- there's

different ingredients than just 1 or 2 things inside vaccinations. Theres several things that go into every vaccine and look at how many shots we were giving our kids.

When my first son was born 21 years ago, versus to what my 14-year-old daughter has to get now for school is greatly difference. And that was just a short period of time. We're increasing the number of vaccines were giving to the kids, and we're increasing chronic illness, we're increasing autism. Why wouldn't we just question --

HUNT: How do you know that that's connected?

MULLIN: We don't. But why wouldn't we look into it?

HUNT: Well, why would --

MULLIN: So what's wrong, Kasie? What's wrong with questioning it? Why shouldn't we question it? As a parent, I know you're a parent. I'm a parent. Why wouldn't we question it?

What is wrong with Bobby questioning what the CDC is doing? Because it's not working right now.

HUNT: Well, he's in charge, and he controls access for many Americans because what the CDC says and does with its vaccine schedule affects insurance.

[16:40:04]

It already has taken away choice for people who want to get the COVID vaccine at their local CVS in over a dozen states.

How is that giving people more choices and allowing them to question more effectively?

MULLIN: Anybody who wants a COVID vaccine, they can go get it. They may not be able to get it at every pharmacy they walk into. But you know, and I know they can get it. It's offered in every state. It's offered in every city.

It may not be offered in every town like my town of Westville. I'm sure it's not offered in that town because we -- I mean, we don't have a hospital. We don't have a national pharmacy. We have a hometown drugstore.

So. But it's available and it's relatively available. So, for people to say that it's not available at CVS anymore, that's nothing to do with Bobby.

HUNT: The issue being that the CDC resignations came because, according to the now ousted CDC director, who was appointed by President Trump, she was asked to accept vaccine recommendations around the children's vaccine schedule that she didn't want to accept. And that schedule is something that affects every American and what they're able to do. Are you comfortable with the way that that board has changed,

considering what Ms. Monarez says?

MULLIN: Absolutely correct. I mean, I actually am.

Here's what -- here's what I know about business, and I'll take a CDC as a business for a second, because we all make decisions based on two things the way we were raised in our life experiences. Business is my life. I know that you need a hire right. You need a fire right.

And everybody you hire isn't actually the right person. Sometimes you got to fire that person, too. And if they're not -- if they're not working with your direction that you're wanting to move either in that organization or they were part of the organization before you got there, sometimes they just don't belong anymore.

And when you have a failing business, if you take over a company, you have a failing business. Not everybody's going to be successful. That works there because it was failing for a reason. CDC has been failing.

We know that by just looking at statistics of where we were in 1950 to where we are today with chronic illness alone, we know it's failing. So there has to be changes made.

And what Secretary Kennedy is doing is he is questioning science and he's bringing in change. We should be thankful that this administration is trying to change the healthiness of American -- of the American people. When we are when we look at where we are today as far as being the sickest nation in the world, we have to make changes. And it's becoming a national security risk.

Think about this, only two -- what is it? Eight out of ten kids today aren't eligible to serve. And -- within DOD, meaning they're not qualified to even go through boot camp. So only two out of ten kids can actually pass the.

HUNT: Do you know how many vaccines that are required to join the United States military though?

MULLIN: I'm well aware of it. Well aware.

HUNT: Yeah, of course you are. And I mean, look, in your home state of Oklahoma, tetanus, polio, MMR, hep A, hep B, chickenpox, kids have to have all these to go to school. And if there are kids that don't get this regime, the other kids around them are more likely to get sick. No?

MULLIN: How many vaccines are we giving out today?

HUNT: To our children?

MULLIN: To our children?

HUNT: Well, if you listen to --

MULLIN: All the way through before they go to college. HUNT: Well, I think that the what RFKs answer would be is about 76.

But the way that that obscures it's the number of shots for several of these --

MULLIN: And what was it in 1980?

HUNT: Sir, I -- this is -- I don't know, because I didn't vaccinate kids in 1980. I'm doing it now. So I know the vaccines now.

MULLIN: So just use your number is 76. And let's go back to just use another number of seven. Because it was under ten in 1980.

HUNT: I would just like to clarify that, 76 is misleading. It is used by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., but it counts up the number of times there are, say three courses for MMR, right? You need three shots over years to get vaccinated for MMR. So, when you count them all up its 76. But it's misleading because the number of diseases that you're vaccinating against is closer to 20.

MULLIN: Okay. Well, let's just use -- is it being effective? Because if we have 76 percent --

HUNT: Well, my kids have not had any infection.

MULLIN: But if were looking at 76 percent of the population now has chronic illness, one out -- or two out of -- one out of every ten kids today have autism. What is it? Are we healthier as a nation or are we not?

HUNT: But why is that about vaccines?

MULLIN: We don't know if it's about vaccines. What we're saying is -- what Bobby's doing is questioning science.

HUNT: But you're taking --

MULLIN: It was okay.

HUNT: You're going to risk dying of measles.

MULLIN: We're not going to die -- we're not taking the risk of measles. We're not anti --

HUNT: More kids have died of measles in this country this year than, you know, in decades.

MULLIN: If you want to get into that, we can talk about the opening of southern border and what caused that. Because you had an inflation over 20 million people that came over illegally under the Biden administration that wasn't vaccinated. We're not talking about measles outbreaks from kids that were born and raised here inside the United States. We're talking about ones that were brought over here illegally. And you can make that connection. Theres no one can argue that.

HUNT: Okay. Well, sir, I think we actually are probably out of time here. Although there were a number of other things I'd like to ask you about, and I know you wanted to talk about one thing in particular, which is this backlog --

MULLIN: Wherever you want to go.

HUNT: Are you sure? Okay, they were very -- they were very specific. I must ask a question.

MULLIN: Kasie, I'm on your time.

HUNT: All right, well, in that case, I want to say thank you very much for doing this, I appreciate it. I hope you'll come back.

MULLIN: Absolutely.

HUNT: I appreciate the back and forth always.

MULLIN: Yes.

HUNT: All right. Coming up next here, the issue that prompted a rare public appearance by the first lady today at the White House.

[16:45:07]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MELANIA TRUMP, U.S. FIRST LADY: The robots are here. Our future is no longer science fiction.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

M. TRUMP: The robots are here. Our future is no longer science fiction. During this primitive stage, it is our duty to treat A.I. as we would our own children, empowering but with watchful guidance.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: The robots are here, she says.

[16:50:01]

The first lady, surrounded by cabinet members and tech CEOs, hosted a meeting of the White House Task Force on Artificial Intelligence Education this afternoon.

So, this was just her eighth public appearance at the White House this year. Some of the CEOs who joined the first lady are staying for dinner tonight with President Trump. Among those on the guest list, Mark Zuckerberg, Tim Cook, the CEOs of OpenAI and Google, and Bill Gates. You might notice one person missing from the list, Elon Musk, the Tesla CEO, former special adviser and friend to the president, said he was invited but not able to make it. This was supposed to be the first dinner in the newly refurbished Rose

Garden. Due to stormy weather in Washington, it's now been moved inside and will be held in the state dining room.

Our panel is back.

Lulu, yes. Go ahead.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: No, I just had this thought. If they're supposed to treat the robots like our own children, the good news is they don't have to get vaccinated. And so just to -- just to bring it all together, I think it's going to be okay.

I actually didn't know that this was real. When I saw it. I thought it was A.I. generated.

HUNT: Chuck?

TODD: I don't know where to go from here.

HUNT: You never don't know where to go.

TODD: Look -- I --

HUNT: You always know where to.

TODD: I -- you know, this -- I think, you know, you go. This is one of those to me, fairly normal events. What's interesting, what makes it interesting is her participation because she rarely gets involved in anything that's as close to the to the sort of White House, you know, agenda as she is on this one. It's an interesting way to use her. Given how little she's been, sort of a part of this second term.

But other than that -- I mean, I -- you know, look, we could the Elon Musk issue is obviously. But I'm sort of still overwhelmed by the Kennedy issue anyway. And that I mean, that to me is still sort of the front and center.

This feels like such a -- this -- I get why people were interested in this, but this feels like a very small deal now.

HUNT: Right. Well, I mean, I felt that way too. And part of me actually still wants to keep talking about what we just heard from Senator Markwayne Mullin, Adrienne, because this is kind of the way that this argument gets made. Right, which is, you'll say vaccines prevent disease and then in the in this case, the senator responds by saying, well, look at all this chronic disease. Look at autism with no clear scientific link between the two.

ELROD: Correct. First of all, props to you for the interview, Kasie. You held them to account. You did a really good job keeping the facts straight, which is so critically important when you have surrogates like -- Trump surrogates like Markwayne Mullin really spewing disinformation and misinformation.

I mean, this is the problem that we have here. The science exists. That is why the CDC exists. That's why we have billions of dollars poured into NIH so that you have a government backed, nonpartisan set of entities that are focused on the science.

So, when you start going out there and saying, well, why shouldn't we question it? Well, that is why we have research. So, it's incredibly terrifying to see, you know, many Trump surrogates out there going out there and backing up what RFK is doing, which is why -- it's so critically important that we all stick to the facts, stick to the right information.

People can question, you know, science. But when you have these entities that have existed in the United States for a long time that are government backed, that are research based, and you start questioning them, that's where it becomes terrifying.

HUNT: I will just say, I appreciate that Senator Mullin is willing to come on and take skeptical questions, because there are quite a few people who are willing to just say what they believe on the internet and not actually take any -- take any pressure --

TODD: I think it's notable, though, what he didn't do. I mean, he didn't say the vaccine -- you know, he was trying not to get at the issue, which I think comes back to the J.D. Vance tweet. They know this is wrong, so they can't deal with the facts that are facing them, which is the vaccine skepticism.

So where do they go? Well, let's go over here to the to the chronic disease issue or look, hey, look over here.

HUNT: What do you mean about the J.D. Vance tweet for --

TODD: So, J.D. Vance, you know, he basically attacked the senators for trying to go after Kennedy, but he never once defended anything Kennedy said. Never once backed up Kennedys claims about vaccines or Kennedys claims about what was going on at the CDC.

So, he pivoted, right? And that's exactly what Senator Markwayne Mullin did as a political decision. I get what they're trying to do.

Kennedy is a disaster. Kennedy is a political five alarm fire. So, you try to deflect.

(CROSSTALK)

HUNT: Kennedy pointed out earlier.

TODD: Yeah, it is a deflection. And that's what he did here. He never -- he just said himself, all of his kids are vaccinated, okay. So, you know, it is -- I think in some ways the gymnastics performance that he attempted, you know, that those that isn't easy to do. And you're right that the Trump White House should be really thankful that he was willing to do that.

HUNT: Well, he was an MMA fighter. So, as he said, you know, he's been punched in the face.

TODD: Yes.

HUNT: What's an interview?

All right. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:59:26]

HUNT: All right. This is an aerial view of the link, where there's going to be a whole lot of brotherly love on that field. This is, of course, my hometown of Philadelphia. The reigning Super Bowl champs, my Philadelphia Eagles taking on divisional rivals, the Dallas Cowboys, is what the script says. But that really doesn't capture the level of animosity in this rivalry.

My fellow Eagles fan Jake Tapper, Jake, thank God you're not a Cowboys fan. I couldn't do the segment if that were the case. You're standing by for --