RFK Jr. will testify before the Chamber, Senate Committees in the midst of dismissals, revision in HHS

The Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Proposed Budget and its impact on HHS.

Kennedy will appear before the Chamber Assignments Committee on Wednesday morning and the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (Help) Committee of the Senate in the afternoon.

Last month, the Help Committee called Kennedy to testify on the restructuring of the department.

In April, the HHS began to fire about 10,000 workers and consolidating 28 institutes and centers in 15 new divisions.

Including the approximately 10,000 people who have stayed in recent months through early retirement or deferred resignation programs, HHS general personnel are expected to fall from 82,000 to around 62,000, or approximately a quarter of their workforce.

In Video statement posted in x Before the dismissals, Kennedy said he plans to bring to the agency a “clear sense of mission to radically improve the health of Americans and improve the moral of the agency.”

Kennedy has defended the cuts as necessary to eliminate waste spending in one of the largest departments in the United States, but has received criticism for saying goodbye to people responsible for regulating tobacco use, monitoring lead exposure in children and diagnosing black pulmonary disease in miners.

The secretary himself seemed not to know about some of the cuts, telling CBS News last month that “was not familiar” with several cuts cited by the exit.

On Wednesday he will mark the first time that Kennedy testified before Congress from his confirmation hearings at the end of January, and can be forced to face statements that made critics say they are evidence of broken promises.

Kennedy said several times during his audience in January that he supports vaccines, although he refused to say unequivocally that vaccines do not cause autism, although numerous existing studies already show that there is no link.

“I support the measles vaccine. I support the polyomyelitis vaccine. I will do nothing as HHS secretary that makes people difficult or discourage to take any of those vaccines,” Kennedy said.

However, in March, HHS confirmed that disease control and prevention centers will study whether vaccines cause autism.

In addition, following several ongoing measles outbreaks in the United States and more than 1,000 cases so far this year, Kennedy has shared contradictory opinions about vaccines.

In a publication on X on April 6, Kennedy said that the “most effective way to prevent measles spread” is to receive the measles vaccine, papers, rubella (MMR). However, in a publication later that night, he said that more than 300 children have been treated with an antibiotic and steroid, none of which are recognized treatments or priests for measles.

Kennedy’s hug of antivacamic ideas almost endangers his confirmation, since he faced the resistance of Louisiana Republican senator, Bill Cassidy, a doctor who directs the help committee. Cassidy expressed concern about Kennedy’s opinions about vaccines before voting ultimately to move it through the confirmation process in February.

Cassidy said, at that time, that Kennedy assured him that he would not alter vaccine policy without “agreed” scientific evidence. The senator added that Kennedy and Trump’s officials promised him a “unprecedented collaboration employment relationship” with the secretary.

Currently, Cassidy does not believe that Kennedy has violated the commitments he made, a person familiar with the thinking of the senator told ABC News.

The men speak several times a week and have maintained a productive relationship, said three people with knowledge of their dynamics.

An HHS spokesman said Kennedy “maintains a professional and respectful relationship with Senator Cassidy, based on a shared commitment to public health and the formulation of evidence -based policies.”

Cassidy plans to tell Kennedy on Wednesday that the secretary can “clarify the record” about how HHS “will maintain his critical duties and implement an important change for the health of Americans,” according to an excerpt from Cassidy’s comments, which were obtained by ABC News.

Cheyenne Haslett and Anne Flaherty of ABC News contributed to this report.