Trump Admin Appeals ACIP Court Ruling So RFK Jr. Can Continue Fucking With Vaccines
from the of-course-they-did dept
It took longer than I thought it would, but the Trump administration’s appeal of the court ruling and injunction that put a pause on RFK Jr.’s remaking of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) and vaccine policy has come through.
If you need a reminder on how we got here, here you go. In June of ’25, Kennedy fired every single member of the CDC’s ACIP panel, a group of advisers that recommends vaccine schedules for the country. He then appointed what were eventually 13 new members to ACIP, nearly all of them virulent anti-vaxxers or otherwise aligned with Kennedy’s misinformed views on medicine and science. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) sued earlier this year, arguing that Kennedy had violated the American Procedures Act (APA) by his actions, specifically because he did not follow evidence, proper procedure, or factual science in the appointments. The court agreed, ruling against the administration and issuing a preliminary injunction on HHS for staffing ACIP with the new appointees and nixing any of the recommendations it had made thus far.
And so now the administration has appealed that ruling, though it’s any wonder as to what the administration’s arguments will be for the appeal.
A filing Wednesday evening in the District of Massachusetts indicates the administration is appealing Judge Brian Murphy’s order March 16. Murphy put any decisions made by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory committee on hold, ruling that Kennedy replaced the committee “unlawfully.”
Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate signed the appeal.
The Justice Department could file a motion for emergency relief to get the court to act on its appeal immediately. That would require the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to act quickly in deciding whether to stay, or pause, the March 16 ruling.
Regardless, the court activity on this will likely eventually take months to work out. The AAP isn’t backing down, with its attorney vowing to respond to the appeal and taking the posture that it believes they will prevail. Reading the APA statute, I very much tend to agree, but this is Trump 101 stuff. Never back down, exhaust every legal avenue to get your way, and hope someone along the way fucks this up so you get your way. That the final leg on this journey might be a Supreme Court that often looks like another part of the Executive Branch, rather than an independent arm of government is certainly part of the calculus.
But in the meantime, two things remain true. The Trump administration, which has at times made noises about wanting to rein in Kennedy and his nonsense, is working hard to allow him to continue to make America sicker. And because of Kennedy’s refusal to follow basic protocol and science, the country is without a competent body to advise on vaccination schedules.
Meanwhile, the status of the advisory panel — a key group meant to be composed of vaccine experts independent of government influence — is in limbo.
A meeting that had been scheduled for March at which members were expected to discuss Covid shots has been postponed indefinitely. The committee is supposed to meet again in late June. There is no agenda yet.
Given the current makeup of the panel, that may indeed be the best possible outcome currently. But it’s not a long term plan, nor a long term positive. ACIP existed for a reason. The country needs intelligent, sincere, and sane people advising the country on how to combat infectious diseases with medicine and technology.
We are without that right now, purely because Trump thought putting Kennedy in charge of HHS was anything other than a form of national self-harm.
Filed Under: acip, anti-vaxxers, cdc, doj, donald trump, rfk jr., vaccines
Comments on “Trump Admin Appeals ACIP Court Ruling So RFK Jr. Can Continue Fucking With Vaccines”
The states still have separate health and human services departments, or departments of health, or whatever analog to the federal system they made. Technically we have at least 50 more health departments to look to for better information. I don’t know if tribes have their own health departments but if they do I would probably believe them over the current leadership.
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Unfortunately, red states have a lot of MAGAt’s and anti-vaxxers in those positions. So they’ll do whatever their lard and enslaver tells them to, which would be: “listen to the brain worm guy”.
(I still believe the brain worm starved to death, RFK jr. didn’t have much of a brain to start with)
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The only people listening to brain worm guy are people who support pedo guy. They can get what they asked for. I don’t see the problem.
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The problem is that people who don’t listen to RFK Jr. and/or Trump also live in the same places as people who do, and I’m guessing the ones who don’t listen to those dipshits would prefer not to get sick because of the people who do.
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I do live in an area with MANY MAGAt morons, that believe anything that falls out of the tRumps’ mouth. Including: “I believe fully that JFK jr. will MAHA!”. Hell, COVID is still killing loyalist MAGAt’s near me, other preventable diseases will soon enjoin. You know the ones we were vaccinated against in order to attend school (TDAP, MMR,etc…).
(I’m still waiting on Polio to make a re-appearance)
There is a point even to hopeless suits
For one thing, they are tiring out the judicative and eroding the standards of what is perceived as sane.
For another, they are using bullshit cases for sounding out the court venues in order to know where to file when they really need a judgment defeating the law and the Constitution.
You need to shake things up a bit in order to keep track of any loose Cannon you might employ to your benefit.
Never heard of that act
I always thought the APA was the Administrative Procedures Act (or the American Psychological Ass’n).