Republican senator denounces Trump’s ‘crazy, stupid’ claims about MMR vaccine safety

Outgoing Louisiana senator Bill Cassidy, a medical doctor, voted to confirm anti-vaccine activist RFK Jr as health secretary before speaking out

Republican senator Bill Cassidy – a medical doctor who voted to confirm anti-vaccine activist Robert F Kennedy as federal health secretary in early 2025 – on Sunday denounced Donald Trump’s “crazy, stupid” claims about the safety of the combined MMR vaccine for undermining faith in immunization.

When Trump recently ordered changes to the recommended childhood vaccination schedule, with Kennedy by his side, the president called for two shots of the combined Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccine to be scrapped in favor of two doses of three separate vaccines, claiming that the MMR shots are “sort of like a nuclear weapon” that could be “quite lethal”.